(lat) Evel Knievel, the flamboyant motorcycle stuntman whose thrilling triumphs and spectacular failures enshrined him as America's consummate daredevil, died Friday in Clearwater, Fla. He was 69. Knievel, who survived at least 38 broken bones, multiple concussions and countless abrasions acquired in daring jumps that ended in unplanned crashes, had been in failing health for years, including suffering from diabetes and idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, an incurable condition that scarred his lungs. Longtime friend and promoter Billy Rundle told the Associated Press on Friday that Knievel had difficulty breathing at his Clearwater condominium and died before an ambulance could get him to a hospital. "It's been coming for years, but you just don't expect it," said Rundle. "Superman just doesn't die, right?" Knievel died only three days after it was announced that he and rapper Kanye West had settled a federal lawsuit over the use of the legendary daredevil's trademarked name and likeness in a popular West music video. Many of Knievel's successes were remarkable -- riding fast motorcycles up steeply pitched approach ramps and vaulting through the air over as many as 20 cars or 14 Greyhound buses before landing safely on descent ramps as far as 150 feet from the takeoff point. But it was some of his defeats that won him his greatest fame -- slamming to the pavement in a Caesars Palace crash that left him in a coma for a month and falling into an Idaho gorge in a failed attempt to leap across the 1,700-foot-wide Snake River Canyon on a specially designed "skycycle." Despite repeated accidents that cost him a total of more than three years in hospitals, Knievel once told the Wall Street Journal that there was only one incident that prompted him to drop a stunt from his repertoire. He said he used to stand in front of a motorcycle speeding directly toward him, jumping spread-eagle at the last second as the cycle and its rider flashed beneath him. In 1965, in Barstow, he didn't jump quite high enough. The motorcycle, going about 60 mph, hit him square in the groin. "A highway patrolman covered my head with a blanket," Knievel said. "He thought I was dead. So did I."

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