dnt ca window washer falls onto car_00005409.jpg
Window washer plunges onto car
00:59 - Source: kpix

Story highlights

NEW: Man is in surgery with life-threatening injuries, police spokesman says

He landed on a moving car and bounced into the street

Witnesses say window washer dangled from rope

CNN  — 

One witness thought she came upon a lifeless body during her routine walk in San Francisco – but firefighters say the man who was lying in the middle of the street survived a fall as high as 10 stories.

The man, whose name was not released, is a window washer who fell from a building, the San Francisco Fire Department said.

He fell between eight and 10 stories, landed on a moving car and bounced into the middle of the street, fire officials said.

Witnesses said he appeared to be dangling from a rope before he fell, according to Albie Esparza, spokesman for the San Francisco Police Department.

“He looked lifeless,” the witness, Maa-Becca Tucker, said on Twitter. She looked at the car on which the the window washer landed and it was totaled – “as if another car came from above and fell on top.”

As of Friday evening, the man was undergoing surgery for life-threatening injuries, Esparza said.

CNN’s Mariano Castillo and Tony Marco contributed to this report.