TRAVERSE CITY — A Traverse City man received a rude awakening when the dumpster he was sleeping in was picked up by a garbage truck.
At 5:15 a.m. on Friday, the truck’s driver was emptying a dumpster in the area near Big Boy and Meijer near US-31 when he heard someone screaming, Grand Traverse County Sheriff’s Lt. Jon Morgan said.
When the driver got out of the cab of the truck to check, Morgan said, he could hear the man in the back of the truck yelling.
Since the driver was unable to open the truck without running the compactor, he returned to the shop so that maintenance people could open the truck without running the man through the compactor, he said.
The 55 year-old was then transported to Munson Medical Center with non-life threatening injuries.
Grand Traverse Metro Emergency Services Authority said their crews helped extract the man from the truck.
They subsequently posted a warning on social media, advising people that, even though temperatures are dropping in the area, dumpsters do not provide safe shelters.
According to their post, dumpsters are “dangerous places to sleep” for many reasons, including what they may contain and the unpredictability of when they are emptied.
“Great work to all involved – especially the truck driver for becoming aware of this emergency,” the emergency services authority wrote.
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