No, it wasn’t Santa Claus. It was a would-be burglar in Alice Springs, Australia, who got trapped in a chimney there.

Staff at the Grapeview Hotel heard the man moaning when they opened the business at 8:30 AM on December 28.

“He was like a grub in a cocoon when we found him,” said Alice Springs fire station officer Mark James.

“When we finally got the prickwick (sic) out he was really wedged in there.”

The unidentified man, believed to have been trying to break into the hotel bar to get alcohol, had been stuck on the smoke shelf, with his knees jammed tightly into his chest.

“He was that wedged … it was a life and death situation,” James said.

“He was pretty embarrassed and ashamed so he didn’t say much when we got him out, he was obviously feeling sore and sorry for himself.”

When firefighters showed up, some of the hotel staff had made their way to the roof and were talking with the man.

“As they had walked through the building they’d heard noises, moaning and calling for help,” said Mr James.

“They were on the roof talking to him through the walls, and he told them that he’d tried to get in about midnight last night.”

This meant that the man had been stuck in the chimney for more than 10 hours.

“Imagine being in the tightest ball you can and being in that position for 10 hours,” said James.

Firefighters and paramedics spent an hour and a half trying to free the man and James said that in the end they had to remove a section of the chimney with jackhammers.

“We went through a few different ways of trying to get him out,” he said.

“Because we’ve never been confronted by anything like this before, (it was) a little bit daunting, but we just worked through it and he’s fine.”