Story:
Meet Frane Selak The Luckiest Unluckiest Man in the World
The Man Who Cheated Death 7 Times!
Other Versions
There’s an 89-year-old man named Frane Selak who survived a train wreck, being blown from a plane, a bus crash in a river, two car explosions, getting hit by a bus, and being ejected from his car in an accident just before it plunged over a 300-foot cliff. He later went on to win over $1 million in the lottery.
Fact Check:
An unbelievable story in circulation online mentions about Frane Selak The Luckiest Unluckiest Man in the World. After allegedly cheating death seven times before winning over $1 million in lottery, the 89-year-old man is dubbed as the world’s luckiest man. The death defying incidents mentioned are a train wreck, plane crash, bus crash, two car explosions, bus hit, and another accident when his car plunged over a 300-foot cliff. But as explained below, the unbelievable claim about Frane Selak is only Partially Fact.
Frane Selak The Luckiest Unluckiest Man?
Frane Selak is 89-year-old music teacher from Croatia who became famous after he won £600,000 lottery in 2003. Later the alleged stories about him cheating death seven times became so popular that there’s also an animated video on him:
Flaws in Claims
As you can see in above video, the survival stories in series of accidents appear too good to be true. The story about Frane Selak appeared online in June 2003 when The Scotsman website scotsman.com published an article titled “Fortune smiles on unluckiest man“. Notably, it only mentioned the accidents without giving actual details to verify. Yes, it is a fact Frane Selak won the lottery, but the wild claims of deadly accidents are not verified. There are no official records of the said accidents, where Frane Selak cheated death seven times and survived.
In 2012 The Meta Picture website published the story about Frane Selak The Luckiest Unluckiest Man with some pictures. Later in a comment a Facebook user Zeljko-Jayco Selak said Frane Selak is his father and that none of the mentioned accidents happened to him, except for couple of minor car accidents! He explained that his father dreamed of fame all his life and fabricated the story after winning jackpot:
Another media that copy all those LIES! Photos are fake, and none of that happened to MY FATHER, except a couple of minor car accidents! After winning that jackpot, my dad, who dreamed of fame all his life, have found (and paid!) local journalist to write about “amazing life, full of close encounters with death”. Some foreign correspondents in Croatia, copied the story, without CHECKING ANY EVIDENCES OR PROVES, internet picked it up…and Croatian Baron Minhausen was born! Old man make you, journalists, all fools!
Like Zeljko-Jayco Selak mentioned, we saw many online outlets copied the story from The Scotsman website. Some of them added various other fabricated details and presented the story as an unbelievable fact. Journalists went on to dub Frane Selak as “the world’s luckiest man” and “world’s luckiest unluckiest man”. Also, the video above of YouTube channel “This & That Visuals” was published in ‘Entertainment’ category.
In Conclusion
Considering the aforementioned facts and lack of official records, the story about Frane Selak The Luckiest Unluckiest Man in the World is a hoax. The claim that he cheated death seven times is not true. The only factual part of the story about the 89-year-old Croatian music teacher is the lottery win in 2003. He may have met with couple of minor car accidents earlier.
Hoax or Fact:
Partially Fact.
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