RENO, Nev. — Jeremy Renner, the rugged Marvel star known for slinging arrows as Hawkeye, has laid bare the bone-chilling details of a 2023 snowplow accident that left him crushed, broken, and, by his own account, dead for a fleeting moment on his icy Nevada driveway. In a new memoir published April 29, 2025, the actor unpacks the near-fatal ordeal with stark clarity, revealing how a split-second choice to save his nephew turned into a brutal dance with death.
It was New Year’s Day 2023, near Renner’s home outside Reno, when the nightmare unfolded. He’d been using a 14,000-pound PistenBully snowcat to tow his nephew’s truck, stuck in a snowbank after a brutal Sierra Nevada storm. The job done, Renner stepped out to talk with his nephew, unaware the massive machine was about to roll. Acting on instinct, he lunged to stop it, fearing it would crush his nephew. Instead, the snowcat’s tank-like tracks snared Renner, dragging him under and grinding his body against the ice.
The toll was catastrophic: 38 broken bones, including ribs, knee, ankles, pelvis, face, and hands. His chest collapsed, one lung punctured, his eye socket shattered. Lying on the frozen driveway, Renner’s heart rate plummeted to 18 beats per minute, a level EMTs later described as “basically dead.” In his memoir, My Next Breath, he recalls an eerie calm washing over him, a sensation he calls “electric serenity.” He was sure he’d crossed over, his body shutting down after 30 minutes of labored breathing, each gasp a Herculean effort.
Neighbors, including a doctor, rushed to his side, stemming the blood pouring from his head and keeping him stable until a helicopter airlifted him to a Reno hospital. Surgeons worked frantically, piecing together his shattered frame with metal plates and screws. Renner spent weeks in the ICU, celebrating his 52nd birthday hooked to machines. By April 2023, he was walking with a cane, a testament to grueling rehab and sheer will.
Renner’s account, drawn from his book and corroborated by official reports, paints a vivid picture of the accident’s chaos. Washoe County Sheriff’s Office documents from January 2023 confirm the snowcat’s uncontrolled slide and Renner’s attempt to intervene. The sheriff noted he was trying to protect his nephew, Alex Fries, who helped keep him alive until help arrived. Medical reports listed blunt chest trauma, orthopedic injuries, and over 30 fractured bones, aligning with Renner’s harrowing retelling.
The actor’s gratitude spills onto the page. He credits his nephew, neighbors, and medical teams for pulling him back from the brink. His recovery, chronicled in social media updates through 2023, showed him running up his driveway by November, a far cry from the broken man airlifted off it. Yet the accident’s echoes linger—the sound of his bones crunching under the snowcat still haunts him.
Renner, a two-time Oscar nominee for The Hurt Locker and The Town, has since returned to work, filming the third season of Mayor of Kingstown. His memoir, released by Penguin Random House, hit shelves April 29, 2025. The snowplow accident occurred January 1, 2023, in Washoe County, Nevada.