Sorry, but this is an anatomical impossibility. Deer are not magical animals. They cannot survive for 20 minutes without a functioning heart and set of lungs. There had to have been at least one partially functioning lung and a functioning heart for the deer to remain conscious for that long of a period of time. Either you misidentified the damaged structures or you misidentified the extent of the damage.
^^^I hafta agree. Or....could be what felt like 20 minutes and what appeared to be an alert deer could have been misjudged.
I love it when friends tell me about this big buck they "double lunged" and then trailed it for a half mile before loosing blood. Had to be bullet failure of course.
As DNS said, deer are not magical. But, some do dye harder than others. For example, a mature 300# buck in good health, will go farther when shot thru the boiler room than his 7 month old nubbin' son. Any deer with adrenaline already in his blood will travel farther when mortally wounded, than if it was totally relaxed and surprised when shot. Still, the difference is only a matter of a few yards, not anything more.
Shot a dandy 10 pointer this fall with my bow. Couldn't have asked for a better hit. Put a X thru the heart and both lungs. Buck was completely relaxed when hit and the deer took three, maybe four bounds from where he was hit. Made it maybe 20 yards. He then fell, got back up, fell again and tumbled down the hill. I immediately texted my oldest son "BBD!". The buck laid there for what seemed forever with his head up and looking around. Musta laid his head down half a dozen times and I figured he was done......only for him to lift, or attempt to lift his head again. Because he seemed so alive I stayed still in the stand for fear of spooking him and him taking off. I didn't even take my eyes off him or take the backup arrow off the rest until I could see no movement at all, this included watching his chest for movement with my binoculars(deer was only about 30 yards away). This all seemed like 20 minutes or more to me. Got down, went up to the buck, and looked him over. Impressed at the lack of ground shrinkage, I pulled him into a level position where I could get a good pic of his ornaments and my bow together. I then texted my son again with the pic. Had anyone asked me, I would have told them all this took a good half an hour or so. According to my phone, those two texts were but 12 minutes apart.........
Once I got up to him, dressed him out and saw the damage done, I realized after he fell the first time, there was little or no awareness of what was happening around him. I knew from the start I could never mount the deer, after watching the life go outta those eyes and the valiant attempt he made to stay alert. Maybe a European mount......