OC Register.  Here's the core of the story, followup to a recent, successful rescue at the Newport Wedge:

. . . Zeiger would show up at least twice a week, usually on his day off from school and work at Chapman University, spending anywhere from two to six hours in the water.

Last Friday, he showed up about 9:30 a.m. and took his bodyboard out until the blackball flag went up at 10 a.m., then he hit the water to bodysurf. The unwritten rule is to let the longtimer bodysurfers catch the first few rides.

He said it was a perfect session: the weather was warm, there weren't too many people in the water, and after 2 1/2 weeks of no swell, the 5- to 7-foot waves were a welcome sight.

The wave Zeiger rode wasn't massive by Wedge standards, but any wave at this spot can pose a danger because of how it slams on shallow, cement-like sand. As he rode that fateful wave, he reached the bottom of it and turned, but at the last second, the wave pitched him.

"It flipped me in a funny way. I hit the bottom of the sand, heard a bunch of cracks. When I came out for air, I knew immediately I couldn't move. I started yelling," he said.

A few nearby bodysurfers, along with lifeguards Dan Pham, Travis Pirdy, and Olympic swimmer-turned-lifeguard Aaron Peirsol jumped into action to help.

He was taken away in an ambulance and transported to Hoag, where doctors fused his broken spine - specifically, the T-12 vertebra- together with metal plates and pins. It broke in a way that somehow, miraculously, didn't damage the fragile spinal cord.

"Those are going to be there the rest of my life," Zeiger said, referring to an x-ray on his hospital wall showing four large pins sticking into his vertebra.

The doctor told him that if he had been moved wrong by the lifesavers, or hit the sand slightly differently, he likely would have been paralyzed. They also said he was incredibly lucky.

After four days in the hospital bed, he was able to do what before was the simplest of tasks, and it took every ounce of strength he had. "My body forgot how to stand," he said.

Zeiger still hasn't walked and recovery estimates range from a few months to a few years. He knows he won't be out of the hospital by his 23rd birthday on Saturday. . .

I've had one episode of popping sound in the neck.  At the ER, it turned out to be nothing to worry about.