It's a tricky situation that gives new meaning to the phrase "stuck in the bathroom."
A suburban man was trapped in his own bathroom for more than seven hours before he was finally rescued with the help of police and firefighters.
According to the Park Forest Police Department, a resident became trapped in his home bathroom around 11 p.m. Monday after the locking mechanism on the door “malfunctioned.”
The man was able to open a window in the bathroom, but the window was too small for him to crawl out of so he began shouting for help, authorities said.
It wasn’t until 6 a.m. Tuesday that a neighbor finally heard his cries for help and called 911.
Officers arrived at the scene and removed a screen from the bathroom window, passing the man tools to try and help him escape.
“We gave him a knife to try and jimmy the lock open and nothing would work,” said Officer Ryan Purdy, who was at the scene.
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Purdy said officers couldn’t get into the home since the doors were locked and the landlord was out of state.
They eventually called the fire department for assistance and the man was ultimately able to remove the hinges from the door and take the entire door off to get out.
In total, the rescue took an estimated 45 minutes, Purdy said, noting that the man was not injured and there was no damage to property in the process.
“It’s definitely one of the most unusual calls,” Purdy said.
