The Scariest 'We Need To Leave, Now!' Experiences People Have Ever Had

We all have memories of a scary experience we would much rather not have in our memories.

Experiences such as horrific turbulence on a flight or waiting for a loved one in a life-or-death surgery, where there simply was no getting out of.

Equally terrifying, however, are situations where we could sense danger was imminent, and knew we had to get out as soon as possible.

While we might have told ourselves at the time that we were being overtly cautious, we later might learn that our concerns were unnervingly on the nose.

Redditor Cool-Chipmunk-7559 was curious to hear about frightening experiences people had that they knew they had to get out of immediately, leading them to ask:

"What was the scariest 'We need to leave, now!' moment that you’ve ever had?"

Sometimes, It's Not Just A Feeling

"My fathers' story, not mine, but still."

"He was working in construction as a contractor, leading a team who were working on an old estate on a hillside."

"It was a clear day, weather was fine and they were up there on the scaffolding, working on the chimney."

"Rather suddenly, my father experiences this pressure to go down, right now."

"It's a hassle, you have to climb down this scaffolding, they hadn't been up there all that long, so he resisted for a bit."

"But it was just this tremendous push, this urging, to descend ASAP, so he told his team to go down."

"They asked why, they didn't understand, they were in the swing of things, why go down?"

"My father finally just ordered them down."

"So they went, and a few minutes later they all stood on the lawn, looking at one another sheepishly."

"At that moment, completely unexpectedly, a lighting strike hit the chimney they'd been working on."

"When he told me the story hours later, he was still upset!"- SeredW

Why Some People Genuinely Prefer Electric

"Back in college a group of friends and I were working our Spring carnival."

"The night before the first day opening we had the job of setting up several spaces, and worked until like 2 in the morning putting together booths and tables and whatnot."

'It was crazy cold that night for the area of the country we were in - no snow on the ground, but icy and teeth chattering cold."

"We were done with our work and just about the only people still there at the fairground when one friend was like 'come in here and warm up' through the flap of a mostly sealed food tent."

"I went in and found a group of us drinking beer, stretched out on the tops of tables, surrounded by gas grills that had all been turned on full blast to warm the little tent up."

"Couple of my friends were practically passed out - we’d been working hard, they had a couple of beers, and it was soooo nice and warm in the tent."

"After only a few minutes I, too, was feeling super tired and a little woozy and stretched out on a table."

"The tent got very quiet, and I rolled over to tell a friend that we probably shouldn’t fall asleep in here - and then I saw it."

'The air was wavy like a mirage in the dessert, and there were 6-7 of us laid out straight on tabletops with arms at our sides like bodies on morgue slabs."

"All I could say was 'The gas - get out' over and over as I struggled to open up the tent flaps."

"Once the cold outside air rushed into the tent, a couple of the others sat up realizing what was happening."

"We all stumbled out of the tent - the two who had been in there the longest ended up going to the hospital while the me and the others just had varying degrees of nausea, headaches, and vomiting."

"I don’t think college me really put it together in the moment that we had built ourselves a carbon monoxide gas chamber, but when I had looked over and saw us all stretched out on tables like that there was a very calm voice in my head that said 'this is how they’ll find our bodies' and it freaked me the f*ck out."- purgatori1

And You Thought YOUR In-Laws Were Bad...

"We were camping."

"It was the dead of night and I was sleeping."

"I was maybe 12 or 13."

"My brother comes into my tent, whispers to me that we have to leave while picking me up."

"I don’t question it and I just go, we drive for a bit until he pulls over and makes a call."

"He tells the police that A man was walking around our campsite with a gun, threatening to kill us."

"We found out later it was his girlfriend’s dad."

"Fun times."- lovecraftInk

No Need For A Translation

"I was in Barcelona with some friends, ended up in a pretty 'local' bar and having a few drinks with the barman, he talked about another bar and said he'd take us in a taxi as he was finishing soon."

"Got in a taxi with him and started to drive a LONG way, started to get rural and I asked him how far?"

"He just laughed and said something in Spanish to the driver, who laughed as well."

"We stopped at some traffic lights and I pushed my two (a lot drunker than me) friends out of the car and told them to run."

'Found an other taxi luckily and jumped in, taxi driver was surprised as us, we were miles from anywhere we should havebeen as tourists."

"He was on his way home but took us back to the city."- luker1771

One Of The Lucky Ones

"It was spring of 1998, and I (then 15 F[emale]) was a high school sophomore."

"I had an argument with my mother late in the evening and decided to leave the house to take a walk around town to clear my head after."

"I walked from my suburban neighborhood about 2 miles to downtown and looped around to walk home again."

"It was around midnight on my way back and about a half-mile from home when I noticed a blue pick-up truck pass by me slowly a few times along a main street with no other cars around."

"Once I realized it was the same vehicle after the third time passing me, the primal fear set in."

"Maybe the driver was lost?"

"No."

"I felt my heart racing, my body went numb."

"When the truck passed me a fourth time, it didn't stop but could tell whoever was driving it was definitely scoping me out."

"It drove off again, but I heard it turn around once more over the crest in the hill I was walking up."

"I ran for my life behind a building on the main street and into a neighborhood where I chose to trespass into residential property to avoid this person in the truck who was following me."

"I heard the truck drive by with the engine roaring, accelerating down this small residential street as I hid in the bushes of someone's yard, terrified."

"The truck began scouting this neighborhood."

"When it turned onto another street away from me, I ran down the block further towards home until I was safe, but shaken by the experience."

"A little over a year later, a local man named Rex Krebs was arrested and charged with the abduction and murders of two young women from the same part of town where I had my experience being followed, one of the murder abduction locations on a pedestrian bridge being about 4 blocks from where I hid in the bushes while being followed."

"The newspaper ran a huge story on the case and included in the article's photos, the killer's pick-up truck that he used to abduct his two victims."

"The same truck that was following me that one night."- alcatraz_ghost

There's Always Someone Looking Out For Us

"Years ago, I had flown home to Denver and took the shuttle to the parking lot."

"There weren’t a lot of people on this shuttle, but there was this one guy who kept asking me questions, some semi-personal, and I couldn’t wait to get off that shuttle and get away from him."

"When the driver stopped at my area, I stood up, and then the guy stood up and got off the shuttle."

"I had a really bad feeling in my gut, so I stayed on the shuttle and rode it all the way back to the terminal and back to the parking lot."

"The driver asked me why I didn’t get off the shuttle, and I told him about the guy, and I had a bad feeling in my gut about him, and he said always believe those gut feelings."

"When we finally got back to my area at the park and ride, the shuttle driver waited until I got into my car and backed out before he left."- CrazyHuskerfan

And It Hasn't Gotten Any Better

"Not quite a leave, but....I was living in Kansas."

"My boyfriend and I were sitting on a friend's front porch when cops came flying up the street, slammed on the brakes, and yelled 'get the f*ck in the house!'"

"We did."

"Our friend wasn't home, but thankfully the door was unlocked."

"Turned out, there was a man walking around shooting anything that moved."

"We didn't know this at first - this was around 2002 so we didn't have the net in our pockets."

"Our friend came home maybe an hour later and told us what was going on."

"Not long after there was commotion in the backyard, it was the guy with the police on his tail."

"They arrested him a few feet from the back door."- poetris

It Pays Off To Be One Step Ahead

"Woolsey Fire 2018."

"I evacuated our family at 7:45pm amidst heavy smoke and wind."

"Official evacuation order came at 2am, by which time fire was everywhere, power was out, and roads were gridlocked."-NotDinahShore

Here's Hoping It Was An Animal...

"Was camping at a national park with two friends - three of us in a tent."

"One of those spots that you drive up to and has a picnic table and a fire pit, so it’s not deep woods camping."

"Middle of the night I have to pee."

"Go out to a nearby spot and do my business no problem."

"Walking back I stop to look at the stars and light a cig."

"I’m there maybe a minute or two when suddenly I had a wave of what I can only describe as primal instinct."

"My adrenaline sharpened everything as I listened."

"Nothing had changed, no sounds around, but I just knew something was there and was watching me."

"I calmly put my cig out and walked back to the tent without any sudden movements."

"Got in the tent and waited, listening."

"There was nothing so I figured I must’ve spooked myself out."

"Went back to sleep without issue."

"In the morning, we found our camp spot absolutely destroyed."

"Some animal had come through looking for food, I guess, but not messed with the tent thankfully."

"Even my friend’s old baseball hat that he had been sweating in all summer was ripped to shreds."

"We found pieces of it all over."

"It had been sitting on the picnic table."

"I know to listen to my gut from now on."- Kim_Smoltz_

Not Where You Think It Was Going...

"In high school, we were eating at a Burger King."

"A friend kept saying it was too hot inside, let’s leave."

"No one else felt like it was but she insisted."

"We all walked outsid,e and about 20 seconds later a car smashed through the restaurant where we were sitting."-Evergreentopalmtrees

SPriorities

"1991 - first gulf war - I was 9 years old."

"The first night they started air raids my older brother woke me up telling me to grab my glasses and run to the basement."

"Keeping a hold of those glasses became the most important thing for me to do ever and since."- Careful_Coconut_3975

No Easier Prey Than The Elderly

"Not really a scary one but this past summer, me and my family were at the fair and this guy kept 'running into' my grandma."

"My grandma was 79 years old at the time, I might add."

"We were just going through the fair and at 3 different times throughout the day/night, this guy just kept happening to find where we were at."

"By the 3rd time, we said let’s go cause this guy was clearly stalking us or, more specifically, my grandma."

"Why?"

"I have no clue but we weren’t going to stick around and find out either."- Joe103192

No Greater Gift Than Life

"My wife was about a month out from the due date for our first child."

"Something didn’t seem right to her, and she wanted to go in to get checked."

"I immediately drove her to the hospital."

"The baby’s heart rate dropped really low suddenly and they did an emergency c section."

"He came out APGAR 1 (0 is death), looked exhausted and wouldn’t raise his arms, and was in the NICU for eight days, many of them under an oxygen hood."

"Right after he was born, the anesthesiologist said to us that he might be disabled."

"I have never been so scared in my life, worried that we would lose him."

"My wife was in a room recovering for several days and was unable to see my son in the NICU."

"Every day I would visit my son in the NICU and then go visit my wife."

"On the third day, I brought her a framed photo of him from his first hour in this world, so that she could see him from her hospital bed."

"She broke down in tears."

"On the fourth day, he was out of the oxygen hood and I got to hold him for the first time."

"I brought my wife down to the NICU in a wheelchair later that day, and she saw him in person for the first time since his birth."

"When the nurse said, 'Would you like to hold him?', she burst into tears again, sobbing tears of joy.

"It was quite an emotional time."

"Many years later, he is in college now and perfectly healthy, thankfully."- Southern-Stable-5089

Fear is something that is completely out of our control and affects everyone differently.

But there is, indeed, a difference in being afraid and knowing something is most definitely wrong.

As the saying goes: "When you know, you know."