David Cifaldi was impaled by a trekking pole after falling near the summit of Granite Peak in Montana. The first thing he noticed after the fall was not his injuries, but his missing trekking pole. Events took a horrific turn when he realised that his ‘missing’ trekking pole wasn’t actually missing; rather it had impaled him. The 32-year-old nurse at St. Vincent Regional Hospital in Billings, Mont, immediately assessed the injury. The pole pierced through his left side muscle below the armpit and protruded out his back, missing his chest cavity and lung.