'Let's be careful out there' in tree stands

“It was just one of them deals where I thought, honestly, I don't need one,” Cocannouer said. “I had the mentality it would never happen to me.”

Cocannouer fractured a disc in his lower back from the 19-foot fall.

“Even to this day, it hurts on a daily basis,” he said.

Cocannouer knows he was lucky. He could have landed on his head. Or he could have landed on a fence post, as he was hunting a food plot that had a fence around it.

Fortunately, his bow was hanging in the tree stand and he was not holding it during the fall or he might have landed on an arrow.

And he was hunting with a friend, another important safety tip. Had he been hunting alone, who knows when he would have been found. His cellphone had bounced out of his pocket away from his reach.

“I tried to stand up but couldn't,” he said.

Cocannouer's hunting buddy helped get him to the truck and to a hospital. Now, Cocannouer never gets in a tree stand without a safety harness.

“I make everyone I hunt with put one on,” he said.

The Wildlife Department posted a series of videos on YouTube to show hunters the proper way to use safety harnesses.

“We made our own video because the ones that we could find elsewhere would simply tell you, but not show you how to do it,” Meek said. “It's easier said than done, but worth it when you hear about some tree stand accidents.”