Top of the Mount Saentis near Schwaegalp in the eastern Swiss Alps, October 15, 2009. PHOTO: REUTERS
The 65-year-old man was one of 21 French tourists in the coach when the driver fell ill and collapsed on a high-altitude road near the city of Schwaz in western Austria.
Part of the vehicle was hanging over the road's guard rail, about to fall into a 100-metre (330-feet) precipice, when the man leapt from his front-row seat and pulled the brake at the last second.
Eight missing after landslide in Swiss Alps
"We were a hair's breadth from catastrophe," a police spokesman said, adding it was "incredible luck" that the passenger's reflexes managed to stop the bus.
Nine people were hospitalised in the accident, which took place on Saturday.
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