cyclespeed Loc: Calgary, Alberta Canada

Can you imagine putting your tripod, camera attached, gently over your shoulder to move to a different perspective and cathump! the camera falls off and hits on an uneven brick walkway. Fellow photographers stopped somewhat stunned and said nothing while I picked up my Sony a6000 and began to discover what function if any it still possessed.
Voilà! It worked as well as ever including the kit lens. ( 16-50 ).
Just posted this to illicit other Hogs to share similar close calls or not so close. I am impressed with how well my camera is constructed. What about you?

Peterff Loc: O'er The Hills and Far Away, in Themyscira.

Glad everything was OK, but your comment made me laugh! English, American, maybe Canadian language have differences, but I think you meant elicit - to evoke or draw out (a response, answer, or fact) rather than illicit - forbidden by law, rules, or custom.

We certainly do or have had some illicit UHH members, but it's an interesting concept!

PixelStan77 Loc: Vermont/Chicago

You were just very lucky. The angle of the fall is critical for a good outcome.

speters Loc: Grangeville/Idaho

I had one of my cameras on a tripod and some kid (playing and getting chased by another), ran by and knocked over my tripod and camera. It hit the ground hard (concrete), but luckily the only mark that left was an almost invisible scratch on the plastic lenshood!
It never slowed the cameras performance!

Retired CPO Loc: Travel full time in an RV

I once had a Mamiya 645 film camera fall off the top of my car. This was when they were expensive! I caught it with my foot and then it hit the ground. The film compartment door popped open and ruined the film roll but no damage to the camera beyond a couple scratches. I still think of the photo's lost, but the camera lived to take many hundreds of photo's.

bgrn Loc: Pleasant Grove UT

Last year during the eclipse, with about 5 minutes before totality, using my 80D with the 100-400, someone tripped over the tripod and when it fell I was lucky it landed on a camp chair before falling to the ground. I was lucky nothing was damaged. I was also lucky enough to reset and refocus in time for some once in a lifetime photos. Wasn’t quite so lucky with my 60D, it took a drink while I hiking through some slot canyons and wasn’t repairable.

tradio Loc: Oxford, Ohio

I'm curious, what was the tripod head that let go of the camera?

crazydaddio Loc: Toronto Ontario Canada

Dropped my Sigma 50mmF1.4 ART onto the concrete...glass flew everywhere. Nearly in tears as I knew my wife would not let me replace it (anti-GAS fiend!)....but wait!
...on further inspection, it was my HOYA Pro1 UV filter that shattered. The lens itself continued to function flawlessly. Bent the filter ring so CPLs and future resale value is toast but happy to have that sharp little 50 back in rotation...

SharpShooter Loc: NorCal

You called???
SS

Photocraig

Pix,
As in so many things, and even sayings, the ANGLE is all important. Glad the OP's gear survived.

Plieku69 Loc: The Gopher State, south end

I recently got the hot running wants for the Sigma 120-400 lens. Looking at prices I found one here at UHH for a very good price. Heck it even came with the carry case and box.
Got it in the mail, all ok. Took a bunch of pictures and most did not turn out well, the focus was off. (using an 80D).
Started looking closer at the lens, took the included UV filter off and out falls lots of little glass shards, uh oh, someone broke a filter. Closer examination revealed that the lens barrel had 3/8" freeplay (slide). Broken filter the result of a nose dive to the floor, probably.
Parts no longer available, so I have a spare lens for???

Did I go back on the seller, no figuring it would do no good after time had passed. About a year earlier I had bought a used Canon lens from my local brick and mortar store, got it home and found that it rattled when shaken. They stood behind it.

Ken

Alafoto Loc: Montgomery, AL

In 1988 I was on the roof of a downtown hotel to make photographs of the Air Force 'Thunderbirds' performing at nearby Maxwell Air Force Base. They would perform a stunt over the base, then fly at fairly low altitude over the river to turn and go back to form up for another run. Perfect unobstructed vantage point for shooting, I thought.

At some point I found myself dizzy, probably from vertigo induced by looking through a camera viewfinder at an extreme angle upward, felt myself falling, and fell onto one of four 4'x8' Plexiglas skylights that let sunlight into the hotel's lobby, six floors below. The last thing I remember from my few minutes on the roof is thinking first, oh S___(expletive deleted) I'm going to destroy my camera when it hits this gravel covered roof and skin myself up. Imagine my surprise and terror when the skylight disintegrated allowing me to free fall into the lobby.

I landed in almost the middle of the bar below me which was packed with people celebrating their graduation from the senior NCO academy a bit earlier that Saturday. Luckily, I didn't land on anyone and my fall was (kind of) broken by a planter/wall dividing the bar from the rest of the atrium lobby. I broke two vertebrae in my neck collapsed a lung, rearranged several internal organs and suffered nine separate breaks in my left wrist and forearm.

The camera, a Nikon FE-2 with a Sigma 70-210 f/2.8 landed on the quarry tile floor. It went to a local camera repair shop after I was released from the hospital a couple of months later and had three sheared off screws in the lens's mounting flange removed and replaced. Functioned perfectly after that. I traded all my Nikon equipment not long after for my first auto focus camera, an EOS 630 and a couple of lenses because I was unable to hold up a camera and focus it at the same time due to injuries previously mentioned.

Though a Nikon user for years prior, I opted for the Canon because of Nikon's clunky first generation auto focus.

mas24 Loc: Southern CA

I hate hearing accidental stories like yours. Your accident is not the first nor last to be mentioned on this forum. You camera kept on clicking. I'm lucky, my gear has not suffered any damage because of a drop on a hard surface, such as a brick or concrete. Bricks, concrete, and water are not friends of any camera. There's one word I don't like saying. Oops!! That word can be costly.

jackm1943 Loc: Omaha, Nebraska

That happened to me a few years ago while walking around in the Omaha zoo. My camera, and attached Canon 70-200, fell lens-first onto the concrete walkway. Fortunately, I had the lens shade on and all it did was to jam the shade onto the lens, which I was able to remove later. There were quite a few people around, I picked up the camera and tried to walk away calmly as if nothing had happened, but my knees were weak for a while.

RWR Loc: La Mesa, CA

I bet that next time you mount it yourself, so you’ll know it’s done right!