A close call was captured on amateur video in Nelson on Wednesday, and has already had thousands of hits on You Tube.
Watch here! Lucky guy misses falling Pine
Nelson local Paul Thomas says he feels like he's cheated death, after driving under, and nearly being hit by, a 30 metre falling pine tree.
Thomas says the experience was 'a buzz', but the situation was not so funny for police watching on.
They had set up a cordon when they noticed the swaying tree, unfortunately for Thomas, he was driving inside the barriers and had literally seconds to move.
"I saw the police waving me on, then I saw another police waving me on more frantically, I saw through my front windscreen above me, that the tree was coming down, so I just had to keep going there's nothing else I could do," says Thomas.
As for his car, the only damage was a broken aerial.
Onlookers knew the situation could have turned out allot worse.
"I don't know how lucky that guy was, but the tree missed him by literally inches, people who've seen the video have said did I set it up or something, because it's just so unbelievable that he made it through," says Dave Finlay, cameraman.
Police gave the driver some advice, to buy a lotto ticket, which he did.
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