A 75-year-old man stuck in his car for 14 hours: "It was terrible.

A man from Cleveland said he entered his 2006 Cadillac convertible last month to go for a ride and was stuck inside the vehicle for 14 hours after losing electricity and could not not open the doors.

Peter Pyros told ABC News in an interview that the vehicle had started well when he turned the engine on two weeks before the incident, and he got closer to the car and clicked on his key ring.

Pyros said that he came in and tried to start the car – which, according to him, counts only 12,000 miles – but that would not start. So he tried to go out but said the doors were locked. He clicked on his keychain and nothing happened, so he changed the batteries in the keychain and tried again, without success.

Pyros, 75, said he was starting to panic. He did not have a cell phone to call for help. He lost track of time.

"I tried desperately to get out of the car and I first tried to hit the window," Pyros said. "It did not work, I tried to hit the window with both my feet, it did not work, and then I screamed for help."

"

"

I realized that I was in the car and that I was not going out – that it was a reality, that I was going to die.

ABC News

A spokesman for General Motors, which makes Cadillacs, told ABC News that all Cadillacs are equipped with a mechanical unlocking device – described and identified in the manual.

Pyros said his owner's manual was inside the house. He sweated violently and started screaming for help.

"I was shouting all the time, help me please, help me! I screamed, knocked on the windows screaming. "

ABC News

He said that he was beginning to struggle and that his breathing was becoming laborious.

"

"

The Cadillac XLR has a mechanical unlocking handle on the ground next to each seat, as described in the owner's manual and the GM feature guide.

"It was terrible," he told ABC News.

Pyros, who lives alone, said that he had fainted. Finally, he lost hope.

"I realized that I was in the car and that I was not going out, that it was a reality, that I was going to die," did it happen? he declares.

Pyros said that he was very at peace, knowing that he was going to die, and he was ready to inform his parent of the cause of his death.

Pyros said he wrote a note to his nephew, to find out later, telling him, "I'm dying of a terrible death."

Every time he heard a noise, like a passing car, Pyros said he would scream and hit the windows of the car, calling for help. At dusk, he was exhausted by his efforts and again lost hope of rescue.

"When it was dark, I thought it was that. It's final. There is no way. Nobody will save me. I'm going to die, "said Pyros.

Around 11pm That night, Pyros noticed a light moving in his yard and was delighted to find that it was his neighbor, a firefighter. The neighbor told Pyros that he had been trying to call him about an hour earlier to tell him that his garage door was open and that there was noise coming from him. inside.

Around midnight, after what he described as 14 hours trapped in the Cadillac, Pyros was released and transported to a local hospital.

Tom Wilkinson, spokesman for General Motors, said in a statement that all GM cars are equipped with "a mechanical (non-electric) method allowing occupants to unlock and open the doors in case of power loss".

"The Cadillac XLR has a mechanical unlocking handle on the floor next to each seat, as described in the owner's manual and the GM feature guide."

"Drivers of any vehicle should familiarize themselves with their vehicle owner's manual, including the lock section, and follow up with their Dealer or GM Customer Support Center if they have any questions." said Wilkinson.

Byron Bloch, a court-trained auto safety expert based in Potomac, Maryland, agreed in an interview that the cars all had manual exit options. But he suggested that a clearly labeled emergency exit handle, with a warning label on the sun visor, could help prevent similar situations in the future.

"One is the information on the manual emergency rescue handle and a warning label on the sunshade," Bloch told ABC News at the press conference. telephone interview.

He also suggested the prospect of a "power reserve module that would provide electrical power to the door lock system even if the main battery system does not work".

Bloch said he was lucky for Pyros that the car was "in the garage not in the hot sun".

"If the same thing had happened and the car was out, you know, on a hot, sunny day, the man could have easily … been a foregone conclusion.