February 15, 2025 • 36 mins
What drives someone to survive against all odds? Join me, Melissa, as we unravel unbelievable tales that test the boundaries of human endurance and resilience. From Vesna Vulović's astounding 33,000-foot plunge from a plane explosion to the rugby team's heart-wrenching ordeal in the Andes, these stories defy logic and ignite awe. We traverse the icy treacheries faced by Ernest Shackleton and his crew in Antarctica, revealing the essence of human spirit when confronted with nature's relentless fury. The episode doesn't just recount survival; it celebrates the unbreakable spirit of those who faced the unimaginable and lived to tell the tale.
Journey with us as we explore narratives that push the limits of what it means to endure. Experience Louis Zamperini's unimaginable struggles as a World War II prisoner of war and Ada Blackjack's solitary fight for survival on the desolate Wrangel Island. We'll also share chilling personal accounts, like surviving a fall into a frozen lake or the desperation of being adrift on a Lake Michigan ice sheet. Each story is a testament, not only to survival but to the triumph of the human heart and soul. Prepare to be moved, inspired, and left in awe at the incredible capacity of people to overcome the most harrowing of circumstances.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey everyone, it's your host, melissa, back here at
Strange Deranged Beyond Insane.
So tonight's episode I want totalk about crazy accident
survival stories.
Okay, and ironically, before Istart, one of my clients.
He brought his son into me forthe first time.
This was yesterday, so Friday,and this kid is six years old
(00:24):
and he is so intelligent andhe's like filled with all these
fun facts and two of the storiesthat I'm going to talk about
tonight on the podcast he wasactually telling me about.
He was like hey, did you knowthis happened?
Did you know this person?
And I had to tell him that.
You know, I'm like that'swhat's going to be on the
podcast tomorrow night and so hewants to listen to this.
(00:45):
So I will have to let them knowwhen this airs, all right.
So first I want to start with avery crazy, crazy story, all
right.
So this is titled the Woman whoFell 33,000 Feet and Lived.
Now, of course, I'm not goingto say the names, right?
So bear with me.
So, vesna Volvic she's Siberian, I'm sorry, serbian, and it's
(01:12):
pronounced.
Yeah, I said it right.
Vesna Voluvtic, actually, see,there's always a silent letter
in there.
That's not even shown.
So, anyways, this happenedJanuary 3rd 1950.
Okay, so this was a Serbianflight attendant who survived
(01:36):
the highest fall without aparachute, so 33,338 feet.
She was the sole survivor ofjet flight 367 after an
explosion tore through thebaggage compartment on the 26th
of January 1972, causing it tocrash near oh god, I don't even,
I don't even want to attemptthis um Spreska Kamianc,
(01:59):
czechoslovakia, now part ofCzech Republic.
Now part of Czech Republic.
So air safety investigatorsbasically investigated this
explosion and it was due to abriefcase that had a bomb in it.
So the authorities suspectedthat imagery.
Croatian nationalists were toblame, but no one was ever
(02:21):
arrested.
Following the bombing, volvikspent days in coma and was
hospitalized for several months.
She suffered a fractured skull,three broken vertebraes, broken
legs, broken ribs and afractured pelvis.
These injuries resulted in herbeing temporarily paralyzed from
(02:41):
the waist down.
She made an almost completerecovery but continued to walk
with a limp.
She had little to no memory ofthe incident and had no like
basically no, fears about flyingin the aftermath of the crash.
So she continued to fly, Iguess Despite her willingness to
resume work as a flightattendant, jad Airways gave her
(03:06):
a desk job negotiating freightcontracts.
Feeling her presence on flightswould attract too much
publicity.
Volvik became a celebrity inYugoslavia and was deemed a
national hero.
Volvik was fired from Jad inthe early 1990s after taking
(03:27):
part in anti-government protestsduring the breakup of
Yugoslavia, but avoided arrestas the government was concerned
about the negative publicitythat her imprisonment would
bring.
She continued her work as apro-democracy activist until the
(03:54):
Socialist Party of Serbia wasouted from power during the
bulldozer revolution of October2000.
All right, so that is insane.
I could not imagine fallingthat many feet like just free
falling Literally crazy.
All right, so another prettycrazy story I would say is about
an Andes plane crash.
So a rugby team's planebasically crashed in the Andes
(04:18):
Mountains and it left thesurvivors with like a few
supplies and it forced them tobe desperate and actually have
to eat the dead bodies of thepeople who did not survive.
Um, if you guys are interested,there is a movie on Netflix
about this.
I forget what it's called.
I did start watching it.
I really couldn't get into it.
(04:39):
Um, a movie or a show has tokind of like catch me in the
beginning, you know.
But I probably will go back andwatch it.
But that's very interesting.
And they say you know, whenyou're desperate, you're going
to do anything.
So they yeah, gross.
All right, so moving forward.
(04:59):
This is about Ernest Shackletonand his it's called the
Shackleton's Voyage.
When Ernest Shackleton's ship,the Endurance, was trapped and
crushed by ice in Antarctica, heand his crew miraculously
managed to survive by usinglifeboats and reaching a nearby
(05:20):
island Crazy, so, just out inthe middle of the ocean in
Antarctica.
I mean, can you imagine howcold that is?
All right, so this is calledUnbroken and this is about Louis
Zapparini.
This story details the brutaltreatment Louis Zapparini, an
(05:40):
Olympic runner, faced as aprisoner of war in the Pacific
during World War II, includingphysical and psychological
torture.
All right, so he was taken to atotal of four different
prisoner of war camps in Japanwhere he was tortured and beaten
by Japanese military,specifically including Patishrio
(06:04):
Watanabe.
Because of Zamparini's statusas a famous Olympic runner, he
was later taken to a new prisoncamp at a coal factory and,
after much hardship, he wasfinally released.
Following the war, he initiallystruggled to overcome his
ordeal, afflicted withpost-traumatic stress disorder
(06:25):
and alcoholism.
Wow, um, that's crazy.
I could not imagine, um being aprisoner in another country.
I can only imagine, um, whatthey would do to you.
All right.
So other notable crazy survivalstories Ada Blackjack I love
(06:49):
that name an Alaskan nativewoman who was left alone on
Wrangell Island with minimalsupplies and had to survive on
her own for a significant period.
Damn, I could not imagine beingby myself on an island.
(07:11):
I just think of what's themovie?
Oh my god, with Tom Hanks, theCastaway, the Volleyball.
I'm trying to think of thatmovie here.
I gotta look it up.
I'm having a brain fart, youguys.
Sorry, tom Hanks, oh yeah, itwas well.
I'm sorry, the volleyball'sname was Wilson, it was Castaway
.
I remember watching that moviewhen I was younger and it was
(07:33):
just like so fucking depressing,like I could not imagine
somebody like me that loves totalk and is extremely hyper.
I could not be left alone on anisland.
Okay, so this was this story isBeck Weathers on Mount Everest,
a climber who was left for deadon Mount Everest after being
(07:56):
caught in a blizzard, losingfingers and parts of his face to
frostbite, but managed to makeit back to base camp to
frostbite, but managed to makeit back to base camp.
I seen pictures of this guy'sface and it was utterly
disgusting.
Um, it actually didn't evenlook real.
So look it up.
So Beck Weathers on MountEverest and you will see the
(08:18):
pictures.
And, uh, yeah, very, verygrisly.
And yeah, very, very grisly.
All right, this story is calledAdrift and this is about
Stephen Callahan, a sailor whospent 76 days adrift at sea
after his boat was damaged,surviving through resources and
ingenuity.
(08:39):
Wow, yeah, I could never be inthe middle of the ocean either
by myself.
That would be petrifying, okay,so this story is one of them
that Ben was talking about.
Um, um, all right.
So in 2003, ralston was hikingalone in Blue John Canyon in
(09:02):
Canyonlands National Park insoutheast Utah.
While he was descending intothe remote and exceedingly
narrow canyons, a boulder felland trapped his right arm.
For five days he survived offpacked water and snacks, hoping
someone would find him.
Trouble was, not only was thespot remote, but he also hadn't
(09:26):
told anyone where he was going.
Well, that's the first mistake,right?
I've watched so many of theseshows and I'm like you should
always tell someone where you'regoing, Always have your
location on, especially ifyou're a hiker, an adventurist,
whatever, excuse me, okay.
So, realizing that he may neverbe found, and running out of
(09:47):
supplies, he was forced toamputate his arm by cutting
through the bone using hismulti-tool that included a knife
.
I want you guys to reallylisten to that.
A multi tool Okay, my husbandhas several of those.
In fact, he has them layingaround everywhere and they come
in handy for me.
But we all know that thoseknives are not that big and
(10:09):
they're not that sharp.
That is fucking insane to haveto amputate your arm with a
multi-tool.
Oh God, after freeing himself,he began the seven mile walk
back to his truck.
During his journey, a familydiscovered him and alerted the
authorities.
He lost 40 pounds during hisordeal and somehow miraculously
(10:34):
avoided bleeding to death.
That is truly remarkable.
He now continues to moan hereand works as a motivational
speaker.
That's like so insane to me.
That's amazing that he livedthrough that.
I would say he's definitelymeant to be here, all right.
So now, on January 23rd 2006,ricky McGee was driving through
(10:57):
the Australian outback on hisway to a new job when he picked
up a group of hitchhikers.
The next thing that heremembers is waking up in a
shallow grave in the outbackwilderness with dingoes, which I
think are like dogs, rightScratching at the plastic
wrapped over him.
(11:17):
I gotta look this up again.
I think dingoes yeah, okay,they are like a dog.
The Australian, the dingo, isAustralian wild dog.
Oh my God, that would bepetrifying.
So these dogs are scratching athim and he's wrapped in plastic
(11:40):
.
Unable to locate his car andclueless about his exact
whereabouts, mcgee was forced tosurvive for 71 days out in a
rugged terrain.
He constructed a humpy, a basicform of shelter, using branches
and leaves, and says he mainlylived off eating frogs, leeches,
(12:00):
snakes and drinking his ownurine.
At night he barricaded hisshelter with rocks to prevent
these dogs from trying to eathim as he slept.
Eventually, workers on a remotecattle ranch stumbled upon
McGee, who had become skeletallythin, having lost more than 100
(12:23):
pounds.
He was taken to a localhospital and treated for severe
dehydration and malnutrition.
What exactly happened to himremains a mystery.
Authorities originally expressedskepticism about his story.
He claimed the hitchhikerslikely drugged him and his
vehicle was never found.
(12:44):
Like that's fucking crazy.
The only other thing that I canthink of is maybe he took a
bunch of drugs and got lost andcouldn't remember where his car
was.
I remember when I was like apreteen um, I can't remember if
it was on like 60 minutes, oneof those shows at night, and um,
(13:08):
it showed, like you know, liketeenagers, even older people,
taking like meth, smoking methin like rugged conditions, like
in the winter or in the reallyhot summer, and getting lost and
like having this like thembeing found or you know, um, you
know they like walked into likethe middle of a road and like
(13:29):
flagged down a car and I'mhaving no like thought process
what happened, and they wouldmake up these like crazy stories
that they were kidnapped orwhatever, um, but I'm sure by
the time that this guy was foundthere was probably no traces of
drugs, if he and I'm not sayinghe did by himself, um, but it's
(13:49):
pretty crazy how there's likeno follow-up on the story and
that his car was never found.
Very mysterious.
But those are a few crazysurvival stories.
I really enjoyed those and Iwanted to share them.
Okay, so a more recent survivalstory which I thought was very
compelling actually happenedhere in Michigan.
(14:11):
So this is about aneight-year-old boy who went
missing for two days in MichiganState Park and he ate snow
until being found safe.
An eight-year-old Wisconsin boywho went missing for two days
while camping in Michigan withhis family was found on Monday
afternoon under a log by searchparty volunteers approximately
(14:32):
two miles from his campsite,mass, I'm sorry, mass rescue
teams from Michigan andWisconsin scored the Porcupine
Mountains Wilderness State Parkand that was a 60,000 acre
forested park and they coveredthat whole entire park.
So that's amazing, nate, Ithink it's.
(14:55):
Naomi, a student in the HurleySchool District in Wisconsin,
was last seen around 1 pmSaturday when he went to gather
firewood and join the familycampsite.
Around 1.50,.
Search and rescue personnelsearched for the child within 40
square miles of the campsite ina very remote hilly terrain.
He mentioned that, like he, atone point he seen a helicopter
(15:21):
go over him and he was liketrying to wave them down, but
they didn't see him.
He even seen the guy with hishelmet on, like like the
helicopter, and he could see himperfectly, but the guy could
not see him.
So when they found him, um,they gave him food.
(15:41):
He said that he ate a cliff barand a prime sandwich or
something, um, but I thoughtthat was amazing and the fact
that he ate snow to stayhydrated was so smart.
And, um, he was said to or, I'msorry, he said that he had
prayed.
Right here it says, um, heprayed for rescue and he
(16:04):
eventually was found byauthorities.
I thought that was like very,very, very sweet, okay.
So this story um strikes myheart a little bit differently.
So Tom, who has been on thepodcast many times, he actually
told me about this story I wantto say, at least three years ago
(16:26):
about the Bath school bombinghere in Michigan, and we've
actually been out to that site afew times and we've had a lot
of evidence out there and so oneof the oldest Michigan
residents, um, the survivor ofthe Bass school bombing,
actually died at 114 years old.
(16:48):
But it's crazy that shesurvived that and that was a
horrible, horrible thing thathappened.
Um, it's just, if you guys canlook that up I mean we do have
some episodes on that Um, butthat was the Bass school bombing
, which killed 38 students, sixadults, while wounding 58 others
(17:11):
.
So she survived all that andshe lived until she was 114.
I thought that was just amazingto share.
So another crazy survival storythat actually happened here in
northern Michigan.
This woman her name is KristenAnderson, and this is a suicide
(17:32):
survival story.
Kristen Anderson is visitingseveral Traverse City area
churches to share her story.
Following a suicide attempt,kristen survived an incident
involving a train as a teenager.
It led to the loss of her legsand a battle with depression.
Kristen also wrote a book andit's called Life in Spite of Me.
(18:01):
So that's crazy that shesurvived that.
So she that's crazy that shesurvived that.
Most people do not, I guess,lay on a train track, on a train
track at all, with a traincoming, and survive that.
So the fact that she had justlost her legs, I think is
beautiful and she's, you know,sharing her survival and giving
(18:22):
you know like motivationalspeeches.
I love that.
Sharing her survival and givingyou know like motivational
speeches, I love that.
Okay, so this Michigan survivalstory absolutely fucking haunts
me because I did go through thissome years back with a friend.
Um, I have talked about it hereon the podcast.
Oh boy, just to refresh Um, wewere out ice fishing.
(18:42):
It was too warm to go onto theice, so we were fishing from
dock and my friend had fell intothe frozen lake and went
through and she was in thatwater for a long time.
Myself and two other fishermenwere holding her up.
We could not get her out.
It was one of the most fuckingscariest things that I've ever
(19:04):
been through.
So this just puts literalshivers up my spine.
All right.
So this is called Frozen Terror, one of the greatest survival
stories of all time.
In 1929, a lone ice fishermanfound himself trapped on a sheet
(19:24):
of ice drifting along the shoreof Lake Michigan.
Wow, okay, so, okay.
So the date was Tuesday,January 22, 1929.
There was nothing to hint thatthe day would be any different
from many others.
(19:45):
And you know he loved to spendhis time fishing through the ice
for lake trout.
And um he so.
This guy walked out to hislight-proof shanty, kindle a
fire of dry cedar in the tinystove, sit and dangle a wooden
decoy in the clear green waterbeneath the ice, hoping to lure
(20:06):
a prowling trout within reach ofhis heavy, seven-tinned spear.
If he was lucky he'd take fouror five good fish by
mid-afternoon.
Then he'd go back to shore anddrive the 30 miles back home to
the village of Allenson,michigan, in time for supper.
He claimed that it would justbe another day of winter fishing
(20:29):
, pleasant and uneventful.
The Crane Island Fishing Groundslay west of Wagushance Point I
think Wagushance, I've neverheard of that and at the extreme
northwest tip of Michigan'smitten-shaped lower peninsula.
The point is a long, narrowtongue of sand, sparsely wooded,
(20:52):
roadless and wild running outinto the lake at the western end
of the Straits of Mackinac,with Crane Island marking land's
end.
Both the island and the pointare unpeopled.
On the open ice of LakeMichigan.
A mile offshore, sweet and theother fishermen had their dark
(21:14):
houses.
Fishing was slow that morning.
It was close to noon before atrout slid into sight under the
ice hole where Sweet kept vigil.
He maneuvered the wood minnowaway and eased his spear through
the water, stalking his decoy.
The trout moved ahead a foot ortwo, deliberate and cautious,
(21:37):
when it came to rest directlybeneath him.
Eyeing the slow-moving lurewith a mixture of hunger and
weariness, he drove the speardown with a hard, sure thrust.
Okay.
So when Sweet felt the barbedtines jab into the fish, he let
(22:01):
go of the handle and the heavyspear carried the twisting trout
swiftly down to the reef 30feet below.
After the fish ceased struggling, sweet hauled it up on the line
.
When he opened the shanty doorand backed out to grab the trout
, he noticed that the wind wasrising and the air was full of
(22:23):
snow.
The day was turning veryblustery.
Have to watch the ice on a daylike that.
It might break loose alongshore and go adrift.
But the wind still blew fromthe west on shore.
So long as it stayed in thequarter there was no danger.
About an hour after he took thefirst trout, the two men fishing
(22:45):
near him quit their shantiesand walked across the ice.
To his they said we're going inLou, one of them hailed the
wind is hauling around northeast.
It doesn't look good.
Better come along.
Sweet struck his head out thedoor of his shanty.
Sweet struck his head out thedoor of his shanty and he said I
(23:07):
guess the ice will hold usunless it blows harder than this
.
I want more fish.
He shut the door and went on,leaving him there alone.
30 minutes later Sweet heard thesudden crunch and rumble of
breaking ice off to the east.
The grinding, groaning noiseran across the field like
(23:27):
rolling thunder and the darkhouse shook as if a distant
train had passed.
Oh, I'm already shaking.
It's like giving me anxietyreading this.
Sweet had done enough winterfishing there to know the
terrible sounds of that.
Like he knew what was going tohappen.
So he basically flung open theshanty door.
He grabbed his axe and thetrout and he had, I'm sorry and
(23:52):
the trout that he had spared andhe raced across the ice for the
snow clouded timber of CraneIsland.
Halfway to the beach he saw whathe dreaded an ominous, narrow
vein of black zigzagging acrossthe white field of ice.
When he reached the band ofopen water, it was only 10 feet
(24:13):
across, but it widened veryquickly.
While he watched it, hewondered whether he dared risk
plunging in, and even as hewondered, he knew the chance was
not very great.
He was a good swimmer, but thewater would be numbingly cold.
And he had to reckon too, withthe sucking understow set up by
(24:38):
a hundred thousand tons of icedriving lakeward with the wind.
And even if he crossed a fewyards of water successfully, he
would have little hope ofcrawling up on a smooth shelf of
ice.
He watched the black channelgrow to 20 feet and then to 90.
At least I'm sorry at last,when he could barely see across,
(25:02):
he could see the swirlingsnowstorm.
He turned and walked grimlyback to his dark house.
All right, so oh my God, I hatereading this.
All right, so, basically he waslost.
(25:22):
And then the two men that he hadfished with that morning were
still on Crane Island when theice broke away.
They had stayed on, concernedand uneasy watching the weather,
waiting for Sweet to return.
Through the snowstorm they hadseen black water open offshore.
They knew Sweet was still outthere somewhere on the ice and
they lost no more time.
(25:44):
New Sweet was still out theresomewhere on the ice and they
lost no more time.
They piled into their car andraced for the hamlet of Cross
Village on the high bluffs ofSturgeon Bay, 10 miles to the
south.
There was little the CrossVillagers or anybody else could
do at the moment to help, butthe word of Sweet's dramatic.
(26:07):
I don't know, this is like avery old story.
Basically it was very dramaticand he was lost and they were
basically spreading the word andthis is one of the most intense
searches for a lost man inMichigan's history.
So just to kind of quick quickenthis up a little bit, so little
by little, hour by hour um hope.
(26:29):
You know that searchers kepthope.
No man could survive so long onthe open ice.
The time spun out a day, andthen two days, and then three,
and still the planes and footparties found no trace of sweet.
By Friday night Hope was dead.
Life could not endure throughso many hours of cold storm
without shelter, fire or food.
(26:50):
On Saturday, the last day ofthe search, those who remained
in it looked only for a darkspot on the beach, a frozen body
scored bare of snow by the wind.
At dusk the search wasreluctantly abandoned.
Folks no longer wonderedwhether Louis Sweet would be
(27:10):
rescued or how.
Instead, they wondered whetherhis body would be found on some
lonely beach when spring came,or whether the plane and manner
of his dying would ever be known.
But Sweet had not died Twicemore.
Before dark on Tuesday, hebelieved for a little time that
he was about to escape the lake.
Um, okay.
(27:35):
So the first time he saw HatIsland looming up through the
storm ahead, a timber dot on agray sea that smoked with snow.
No one ever lived on hat.
He would have to find a cabinthere, but there was plenty of
(27:56):
dry wood for a fire and he hadhis big trout for food.
He'd make out all right untilthe storm was over and he had no
doubt some way would be foundto rescue him when the weather
cleared.
But even while he tastedanticipation, the immense relief
of trading his drifting ice fora solid ground, he realized
that his course would take himclear of the island and he
(28:18):
resigned himself once more to anight of drifting.
The next time he drifted up itwas Hog Island, much bigger but
also without a house of any kindthat seemed to lie in his path.
But again the wind, late,played their tricks and was, and
then he was carried evenfurther out and along little
(28:40):
more than a stone throw from thebeach.
That was the first time in mylife I ever wished for wings.
Sweet told one of thejournalists.
Alright, so then this reads onthe storm plays a prank.
That night was pretty bad.
The storm mounted to a ragingblizzard, with the winter
(29:01):
darkness coming down.
The section of ice where Sweethad built his snow shelter broke
away from the main field.
Suddenly and without warning.
He heard the splintering noise,saw the crack starting to widen
into the dusk.
Only a few yards away, hegathered up his fish and his
precious axe and ran for a placewhere the pressure of the wind
(29:24):
still held the two masses of icetogether, grinding against each
other.
Even as he reached it, thecrevice opened ahead of him, but
it was only a couple of feetwide and he jumped across to the
temporary safety of the biggerflow.
Again he set to work to build ashelter with blocks of snow.
(29:45):
He basically spent another dayand night away.
He was out in the open lake nowand the storm had a chance to
vent its full force on the icefield.
Before midnight the field brokein two near him again,
compelling him to abandon hissnow shelter again and start a
(30:08):
new one.
Towards daybreak, the cold greweven more intense and now the
storm played a cruel prank.
The wind hauled around to thesouthwest, reversing the drift
of the ice field and sending itback, almost the way it had come
, toward the distant north shoreof the Lake Michigan.
In the darkness.
(30:28):
However, sweet was notimmediately aware of the shift.
The huge flow, still some twomiles across, went aground an
hour before daybreak withoutwarning.
There was sudden crunching anda thunder like of sound, and
directly ahead of Sweet the edgeof the ice rose out of the
(30:49):
water, curled back upon itselfoh my God and then came crashing
down in an avalanche of two tonblocks.
The entire field shuddered andshook and seemed about to
splinter into fragments, andSweet ran for his life away from
the spot where it wasthundering around.
Oh, wow, all right.
(31:16):
So at last Sweet was close totemporary safety, just 22 feet
away up the vertical concreteface of the crib lay, shelter
and fuel, food and survival.
Only 22 feet, four times hisown height, but it might as well
have been 22 miles, for theentire crib above the waterline
was encased in ice a foot thick,formed by freezing spray, and
(31:41):
the steel ladder bedded in theconcrete wall showed only a
bulge on the smooth, sheer faceof the ice.
Sweet knew the ladder had to bethere.
He located it in the gray lightof the stormy winter morning
and went to work with his axe.
He chopped away the ice as highas he could reach, standing on
the flow, freeing the rungs atthat time.
(32:03):
Then he stepped up on the firstone, hung on with one hand and
went on chopping with the other,chipping and whirring at the
flinty sheath that enclosed therest of the ladder.
Three hours from the time he cuthis first chip of ice away, he
was within three rungs of thetop three steps, less than a
(32:26):
yard, and he knew he wasn'tgoing to make it.
His feet were wooden stumps onwhich he could no longer trust
his weight.
His hands had long since lostall of his feeling.
They were so badly frozen thathe had to look to make sure his
fingers were hooked around therung and he could no longer keep
(32:47):
a grip on the axe.
Okay, the next time he droppedthe axe he wouldn't be able to
come back up the ladder.
He took a few short strokes andthe axe went clattering to the
ice below.
And the axe went clattering tothe ice below.
He climbed stiffly down thehuddle, I'm sorry.
(33:08):
He climbed stiffly down andhuddled on a block of ice to
rest.
Three hours later he finishedthe job and dragged himself,
more dead than alive, over theicy, treacherous lip of the crib
.
Alright, so let's just see howthis plays out.
(33:32):
Oh, it's just giving me anxiety.
So Louis Sweet crept on over theice all that day Again and
again.
He went ahead a few steps, satdown and rested, got up and
drove himself on.
At times he crawled on allfours.
(33:59):
This is a very long story.
I'm just trying to kind of dolike the pinpoints.
Okay, before morning he wasviolently ill, with cramps and
nausea, perhaps from lack offood, from the frozen milk he
had used with the coffee.
At daybreak he tried to drivehimself on toward Cross Village,
but he was too sick to stand.
He lay helpless in the shantyall day, monday through Monday
night, eating nothing.
(34:20):
Tuesday morning he summoned thelittle strength remaining to him
and started south once more,hobbling and crawling over the
rough ice of Sturgeon Bay.
It was quite a walk, but hemade it Near noon that day,
almost a week to the hour fromthe time the wind had set him
adrift on his ice flow.
He stumbled up the steep bluffat Cross Village and called to a
(35:04):
passing man for a hand.
Wow, that is holy shit.
That is an incredible story.
I cannot believe that mansurvived that.
Um, definitely old school man,because, no offense, but the men
(35:27):
here in 2025, I don't thinkthat they would survive that.
But anyways, I thought thesewere very interesting stories
and if you guys have anything toadd or you have your own
survival story, please let usknow.
You know that you can email usat ghost sisters 21, 24, at
Gmail.
You can find us on Facebook,tiktok, twitter, x, youtube.
I think I covered all them.
(35:47):
I say that every time, but,yeah, we definitely want to hear
from our listeners and thankyou guys for listening and tune
in for some more.
Hey everyone, it's your host, melissa, back here at
Strange Deranged Beyond Insane.
So tonight's episode I want totalk about crazy accident
survival stories.
Okay, and ironically, before Istart, one of my clients.
He brought his son into me forthe first time.
This was yesterday, so Friday,and this kid is six years old
(00:24):
and he is so intelligent andhe's like filled with all these
fun facts and two of the storiesthat I'm going to talk about
tonight on the podcast he wasactually telling me about.
He was like hey, did you knowthis happened?
Did you know this person?
And I had to tell him that.
You know, I'm like that'swhat's going to be on the
podcast tomorrow night and so hewants to listen to this.
(00:45):
So I will have to let them knowwhen this airs, all right.
So first I want to start with avery crazy, crazy story, all
right.
So this is titled the Woman whoFell 33,000 Feet and Lived.
Now, of course, I'm not goingto say the names, right?
So bear with me.
So, vesna Volvic she's Siberian, I'm sorry, serbian, and it's
(01:12):
pronounced.
Yeah, I said it right.
Vesna Voluvtic, actually, see,there's always a silent letter
in there.
That's not even shown.
So, anyways, this happenedJanuary 3rd 1950.
Okay, so this was a Serbianflight attendant who survived
(01:36):
the highest fall without aparachute, so 33,338 feet.
She was the sole survivor ofjet flight 367 after an
explosion tore through thebaggage compartment on the 26th
of January 1972, causing it tocrash near oh god, I don't even,
I don't even want to attemptthis um Spreska Kamianc,
(01:59):
czechoslovakia, now part ofCzech Republic.
Now part of Czech Republic.
So air safety investigatorsbasically investigated this
explosion and it was due to abriefcase that had a bomb in it.
So the authorities suspectedthat imagery.
Croatian nationalists were toblame, but no one was ever
(02:21):
arrested.
Following the bombing, volvikspent days in coma and was
hospitalized for several months.
She suffered a fractured skull,three broken vertebraes, broken
legs, broken ribs and afractured pelvis.
These injuries resulted in herbeing temporarily paralyzed from
(02:41):
the waist down.
She made an almost completerecovery but continued to walk
with a limp.
She had little to no memory ofthe incident and had no like
basically no, fears about flyingin the aftermath of the crash.
So she continued to fly, Iguess Despite her willingness to
resume work as a flightattendant, jad Airways gave her
(03:06):
a desk job negotiating freightcontracts.
Feeling her presence on flightswould attract too much
publicity.
Volvik became a celebrity inYugoslavia and was deemed a
national hero.
Volvik was fired from Jad inthe early 1990s after taking
(03:27):
part in anti-government protestsduring the breakup of
Yugoslavia, but avoided arrestas the government was concerned
about the negative publicitythat her imprisonment would
bring.
She continued her work as apro-democracy activist until the
(03:54):
Socialist Party of Serbia wasouted from power during the
bulldozer revolution of October2000.
All right, so that is insane.
I could not imagine fallingthat many feet like just free
falling Literally crazy.
All right, so another prettycrazy story I would say is about
an Andes plane crash.
So a rugby team's planebasically crashed in the Andes
(04:18):
Mountains and it left thesurvivors with like a few
supplies and it forced them tobe desperate and actually have
to eat the dead bodies of thepeople who did not survive.
Um, if you guys are interested,there is a movie on Netflix
about this.
I forget what it's called.
I did start watching it.
I really couldn't get into it.
(04:39):
Um, a movie or a show has tokind of like catch me in the
beginning, you know.
But I probably will go back andwatch it.
But that's very interesting.
And they say you know, whenyou're desperate, you're going
to do anything.
So they yeah, gross.
All right, so moving forward.
(04:59):
This is about Ernest Shackletonand his it's called the
Shackleton's Voyage.
When Ernest Shackleton's ship,the Endurance, was trapped and
crushed by ice in Antarctica, heand his crew miraculously
managed to survive by usinglifeboats and reaching a nearby
(05:20):
island Crazy, so, just out inthe middle of the ocean in
Antarctica.
I mean, can you imagine howcold that is?
All right, so this is calledUnbroken and this is about Louis
Zapparini.
This story details the brutaltreatment Louis Zapparini, an
(05:40):
Olympic runner, faced as aprisoner of war in the Pacific
during World War II, includingphysical and psychological
torture.
All right, so he was taken to atotal of four different
prisoner of war camps in Japanwhere he was tortured and beaten
by Japanese military,specifically including Patishrio
(06:04):
Watanabe.
Because of Zamparini's statusas a famous Olympic runner, he
was later taken to a new prisoncamp at a coal factory and,
after much hardship, he wasfinally released.
Following the war, he initiallystruggled to overcome his
ordeal, afflicted withpost-traumatic stress disorder
(06:25):
and alcoholism.
Wow, um, that's crazy.
I could not imagine, um being aprisoner in another country.
I can only imagine, um, whatthey would do to you.
All right.
So other notable crazy survivalstories Ada Blackjack I love
(06:49):
that name an Alaskan nativewoman who was left alone on
Wrangell Island with minimalsupplies and had to survive on
her own for a significant period.
Damn, I could not imagine beingby myself on an island.
(07:11):
I just think of what's themovie?
Oh my god, with Tom Hanks, theCastaway, the Volleyball.
I'm trying to think of thatmovie here.
I gotta look it up.
I'm having a brain fart, youguys.
Sorry, tom Hanks, oh yeah, itwas well.
I'm sorry, the volleyball'sname was Wilson, it was Castaway
.
I remember watching that moviewhen I was younger and it was
(07:33):
just like so fucking depressing,like I could not imagine
somebody like me that loves totalk and is extremely hyper.
I could not be left alone on anisland.
Okay, so this was this story isBeck Weathers on Mount Everest,
a climber who was left for deadon Mount Everest after being
(07:56):
caught in a blizzard, losingfingers and parts of his face to
frostbite, but managed to makeit back to base camp to
frostbite, but managed to makeit back to base camp.
I seen pictures of this guy'sface and it was utterly
disgusting.
Um, it actually didn't evenlook real.
So look it up.
So Beck Weathers on MountEverest and you will see the
(08:18):
pictures.
And, uh, yeah, very, verygrisly.
And yeah, very, very grisly.
All right, this story is calledAdrift and this is about
Stephen Callahan, a sailor whospent 76 days adrift at sea
after his boat was damaged,surviving through resources and
ingenuity.
(08:39):
Wow, yeah, I could never be inthe middle of the ocean either
by myself.
That would be petrifying, okay,so this story is one of them
that Ben was talking about.
Um, um, all right.
So in 2003, ralston was hikingalone in Blue John Canyon in
(09:02):
Canyonlands National Park insoutheast Utah.
While he was descending intothe remote and exceedingly
narrow canyons, a boulder felland trapped his right arm.
For five days he survived offpacked water and snacks, hoping
someone would find him.
Trouble was, not only was thespot remote, but he also hadn't
(09:26):
told anyone where he was going.
Well, that's the first mistake,right?
I've watched so many of theseshows and I'm like you should
always tell someone where you'regoing, Always have your
location on, especially ifyou're a hiker, an adventurist,
whatever, excuse me, okay.
So, realizing that he may neverbe found, and running out of
(09:47):
supplies, he was forced toamputate his arm by cutting
through the bone using hismulti-tool that included a knife
.
I want you guys to reallylisten to that.
A multi tool Okay, my husbandhas several of those.
In fact, he has them layingaround everywhere and they come
in handy for me.
But we all know that thoseknives are not that big and
(10:09):
they're not that sharp.
That is fucking insane to haveto amputate your arm with a
multi-tool.
Oh God, after freeing himself,he began the seven mile walk
back to his truck.
During his journey, a familydiscovered him and alerted the
authorities.
He lost 40 pounds during hisordeal and somehow miraculously
(10:34):
avoided bleeding to death.
That is truly remarkable.
He now continues to moan hereand works as a motivational
speaker.
That's like so insane to me.
That's amazing that he livedthrough that.
I would say he's definitelymeant to be here, all right.
So now, on January 23rd 2006,ricky McGee was driving through
(10:57):
the Australian outback on hisway to a new job when he picked
up a group of hitchhikers.
The next thing that heremembers is waking up in a
shallow grave in the outbackwilderness with dingoes, which I
think are like dogs, rightScratching at the plastic
wrapped over him.
(11:17):
I gotta look this up again.
I think dingoes yeah, okay,they are like a dog.
The Australian, the dingo, isAustralian wild dog.
Oh my God, that would bepetrifying.
So these dogs are scratching athim and he's wrapped in plastic
(11:40):
.
Unable to locate his car andclueless about his exact
whereabouts, mcgee was forced tosurvive for 71 days out in a
rugged terrain.
He constructed a humpy, a basicform of shelter, using branches
and leaves, and says he mainlylived off eating frogs, leeches,
(12:00):
snakes and drinking his ownurine.
At night he barricaded hisshelter with rocks to prevent
these dogs from trying to eathim as he slept.
Eventually, workers on a remotecattle ranch stumbled upon
McGee, who had become skeletallythin, having lost more than 100
(12:23):
pounds.
He was taken to a localhospital and treated for severe
dehydration and malnutrition.
What exactly happened to himremains a mystery.
Authorities originally expressedskepticism about his story.
He claimed the hitchhikerslikely drugged him and his
vehicle was never found.
(12:44):
Like that's fucking crazy.
The only other thing that I canthink of is maybe he took a
bunch of drugs and got lost andcouldn't remember where his car
was.
I remember when I was like apreteen um, I can't remember if
it was on like 60 minutes, oneof those shows at night, and um,
(13:08):
it showed, like you know, liketeenagers, even older people,
taking like meth, smoking methin like rugged conditions, like
in the winter or in the reallyhot summer, and getting lost and
like having this like thembeing found or you know, um, you
know they like walked into likethe middle of a road and like
(13:29):
flagged down a car and I'mhaving no like thought process
what happened, and they wouldmake up these like crazy stories
that they were kidnapped orwhatever, um, but I'm sure by
the time that this guy was foundthere was probably no traces of
drugs, if he and I'm not sayinghe did by himself, um, but it's
(13:49):
pretty crazy how there's likeno follow-up on the story and
that his car was never found.
Very mysterious.
But those are a few crazysurvival stories.
I really enjoyed those and Iwanted to share them.
Okay, so a more recent survivalstory which I thought was very
compelling actually happenedhere in Michigan.
(14:11):
So this is about aneight-year-old boy who went
missing for two days in MichiganState Park and he ate snow
until being found safe.
An eight-year-old Wisconsin boywho went missing for two days
while camping in Michigan withhis family was found on Monday
afternoon under a log by searchparty volunteers approximately
(14:32):
two miles from his campsite,mass, I'm sorry, mass rescue
teams from Michigan andWisconsin scored the Porcupine
Mountains Wilderness State Parkand that was a 60,000 acre
forested park and they coveredthat whole entire park.
So that's amazing, nate, Ithink it's.
(14:55):
Naomi, a student in the HurleySchool District in Wisconsin,
was last seen around 1 pmSaturday when he went to gather
firewood and join the familycampsite.
Around 1.50,.
Search and rescue personnelsearched for the child within 40
square miles of the campsite ina very remote hilly terrain.
He mentioned that, like he, atone point he seen a helicopter
(15:21):
go over him and he was liketrying to wave them down, but
they didn't see him.
He even seen the guy with hishelmet on, like like the
helicopter, and he could see himperfectly, but the guy could
not see him.
So when they found him, um,they gave him food.
(15:41):
He said that he ate a cliff barand a prime sandwich or
something, um, but I thoughtthat was amazing and the fact
that he ate snow to stayhydrated was so smart.
And, um, he was said to or, I'msorry, he said that he had
prayed.
Right here it says, um, heprayed for rescue and he
(16:04):
eventually was found byauthorities.
I thought that was like very,very, very sweet, okay.
So this story um strikes myheart a little bit differently.
So Tom, who has been on thepodcast many times, he actually
told me about this story I wantto say, at least three years ago
(16:26):
about the Bath school bombinghere in Michigan, and we've
actually been out to that site afew times and we've had a lot
of evidence out there and so oneof the oldest Michigan
residents, um, the survivor ofthe Bass school bombing,
actually died at 114 years old.
(16:48):
But it's crazy that shesurvived that and that was a
horrible, horrible thing thathappened.
Um, it's just, if you guys canlook that up I mean we do have
some episodes on that Um, butthat was the Bass school bombing
, which killed 38 students, sixadults, while wounding 58 others
(17:11):
.
So she survived all that andshe lived until she was 114.
I thought that was just amazingto share.
So another crazy survival storythat actually happened here in
northern Michigan.
This woman her name is KristenAnderson, and this is a suicide
(17:32):
survival story.
Kristen Anderson is visitingseveral Traverse City area
churches to share her story.
Following a suicide attempt,kristen survived an incident
involving a train as a teenager.
It led to the loss of her legsand a battle with depression.
Kristen also wrote a book andit's called Life in Spite of Me.
(18:01):
So that's crazy that shesurvived that.
So she that's crazy that shesurvived that.
Most people do not, I guess,lay on a train track, on a train
track at all, with a traincoming, and survive that.
So the fact that she had justlost her legs, I think is
beautiful and she's, you know,sharing her survival and giving
(18:22):
you know like motivationalspeeches.
I love that.
Sharing her survival and givingyou know like motivational
speeches, I love that.
Okay, so this Michigan survivalstory absolutely fucking haunts
me because I did go through thissome years back with a friend.
Um, I have talked about it hereon the podcast.
Oh boy, just to refresh Um, wewere out ice fishing.
(18:42):
It was too warm to go onto theice, so we were fishing from
dock and my friend had fell intothe frozen lake and went
through and she was in thatwater for a long time.
Myself and two other fishermenwere holding her up.
We could not get her out.
It was one of the most fuckingscariest things that I've ever
(19:04):
been through.
So this just puts literalshivers up my spine.
All right.
So this is called Frozen Terror, one of the greatest survival
stories of all time.
In 1929, a lone ice fishermanfound himself trapped on a sheet
(19:24):
of ice drifting along the shoreof Lake Michigan.
Wow, okay, so, okay.
So the date was Tuesday,January 22, 1929.
There was nothing to hint thatthe day would be any different
from many others.
(19:45):
And you know he loved to spendhis time fishing through the ice
for lake trout.
And um he so.
This guy walked out to hislight-proof shanty, kindle a
fire of dry cedar in the tinystove, sit and dangle a wooden
decoy in the clear green waterbeneath the ice, hoping to lure
(20:06):
a prowling trout within reach ofhis heavy, seven-tinned spear.
If he was lucky he'd take fouror five good fish by
mid-afternoon.
Then he'd go back to shore anddrive the 30 miles back home to
the village of Allenson,michigan, in time for supper.
He claimed that it would justbe another day of winter fishing
(20:29):
, pleasant and uneventful.
The Crane Island Fishing Groundslay west of Wagushance Point I
think Wagushance, I've neverheard of that and at the extreme
northwest tip of Michigan'smitten-shaped lower peninsula.
The point is a long, narrowtongue of sand, sparsely wooded,
(20:52):
roadless and wild running outinto the lake at the western end
of the Straits of Mackinac,with Crane Island marking land's
end.
Both the island and the pointare unpeopled.
On the open ice of LakeMichigan.
A mile offshore, sweet and theother fishermen had their dark
(21:14):
houses.
Fishing was slow that morning.
It was close to noon before atrout slid into sight under the
ice hole where Sweet kept vigil.
He maneuvered the wood minnowaway and eased his spear through
the water, stalking his decoy.
The trout moved ahead a foot ortwo, deliberate and cautious,
(21:37):
when it came to rest directlybeneath him.
Eyeing the slow-moving lurewith a mixture of hunger and
weariness, he drove the speardown with a hard, sure thrust.
Okay.
So when Sweet felt the barbedtines jab into the fish, he let
(22:01):
go of the handle and the heavyspear carried the twisting trout
swiftly down to the reef 30feet below.
After the fish ceased struggling, sweet hauled it up on the line
.
When he opened the shanty doorand backed out to grab the trout
, he noticed that the wind wasrising and the air was full of
(22:23):
snow.
The day was turning veryblustery.
Have to watch the ice on a daylike that.
It might break loose alongshore and go adrift.
But the wind still blew fromthe west on shore.
So long as it stayed in thequarter there was no danger.
About an hour after he took thefirst trout, the two men fishing
(22:45):
near him quit their shantiesand walked across the ice.
To his they said we're going inLou, one of them hailed the
wind is hauling around northeast.
It doesn't look good.
Better come along.
Sweet struck his head out thedoor of his shanty.
Sweet struck his head out thedoor of his shanty and he said I
(23:07):
guess the ice will hold usunless it blows harder than this
.
I want more fish.
He shut the door and went on,leaving him there alone.
30 minutes later Sweet heard thesudden crunch and rumble of
breaking ice off to the east.
The grinding, groaning noiseran across the field like
(23:27):
rolling thunder and the darkhouse shook as if a distant
train had passed.
Oh, I'm already shaking.
It's like giving me anxietyreading this.
Sweet had done enough winterfishing there to know the
terrible sounds of that.
Like he knew what was going tohappen.
So he basically flung open theshanty door.
He grabbed his axe and thetrout and he had, I'm sorry and
(23:52):
the trout that he had spared andhe raced across the ice for the
snow clouded timber of CraneIsland.
Halfway to the beach he saw whathe dreaded an ominous, narrow
vein of black zigzagging acrossthe white field of ice.
When he reached the band ofopen water, it was only 10 feet
(24:13):
across, but it widened veryquickly.
While he watched it, hewondered whether he dared risk
plunging in, and even as hewondered, he knew the chance was
not very great.
He was a good swimmer, but thewater would be numbingly cold.
And he had to reckon too, withthe sucking understow set up by
(24:38):
a hundred thousand tons of icedriving lakeward with the wind.
And even if he crossed a fewyards of water successfully, he
would have little hope ofcrawling up on a smooth shelf of
ice.
He watched the black channelgrow to 20 feet and then to 90.
At least I'm sorry at last,when he could barely see across,
(25:02):
he could see the swirlingsnowstorm.
He turned and walked grimlyback to his dark house.
All right, so oh my God, I hatereading this.
All right, so, basically he waslost.
(25:22):
And then the two men that he hadfished with that morning were
still on Crane Island when theice broke away.
They had stayed on, concernedand uneasy watching the weather,
waiting for Sweet to return.
Through the snowstorm they hadseen black water open offshore.
They knew Sweet was still outthere somewhere on the ice and
they lost no more time.
(25:44):
New Sweet was still out theresomewhere on the ice and they
lost no more time.
They piled into their car andraced for the hamlet of Cross
Village on the high bluffs ofSturgeon Bay, 10 miles to the
south.
There was little the CrossVillagers or anybody else could
do at the moment to help, butthe word of Sweet's dramatic.
(26:07):
I don't know, this is like avery old story.
Basically it was very dramaticand he was lost and they were
basically spreading the word andthis is one of the most intense
searches for a lost man inMichigan's history.
So just to kind of quick quickenthis up a little bit, so little
by little, hour by hour um hope.
(26:29):
You know that searchers kepthope.
No man could survive so long onthe open ice.
The time spun out a day, andthen two days, and then three,
and still the planes and footparties found no trace of sweet.
By Friday night Hope was dead.
Life could not endure throughso many hours of cold storm
without shelter, fire or food.
(26:50):
On Saturday, the last day ofthe search, those who remained
in it looked only for a darkspot on the beach, a frozen body
scored bare of snow by the wind.
At dusk the search wasreluctantly abandoned.
Folks no longer wonderedwhether Louis Sweet would be
(27:10):
rescued or how.
Instead, they wondered whetherhis body would be found on some
lonely beach when spring came,or whether the plane and manner
of his dying would ever be known.
But Sweet had not died Twicemore.
Before dark on Tuesday, hebelieved for a little time that
he was about to escape the lake.
Um, okay.
(27:35):
So the first time he saw HatIsland looming up through the
storm ahead, a timber dot on agray sea that smoked with snow.
No one ever lived on hat.
He would have to find a cabinthere, but there was plenty of
(27:56):
dry wood for a fire and he hadhis big trout for food.
He'd make out all right untilthe storm was over and he had no
doubt some way would be foundto rescue him when the weather
cleared.
But even while he tastedanticipation, the immense relief
of trading his drifting ice fora solid ground, he realized
that his course would take himclear of the island and he
(28:18):
resigned himself once more to anight of drifting.
The next time he drifted up itwas Hog Island, much bigger but
also without a house of any kindthat seemed to lie in his path.
But again the wind, late,played their tricks and was, and
then he was carried evenfurther out and along little
(28:40):
more than a stone throw from thebeach.
That was the first time in mylife I ever wished for wings.
Sweet told one of thejournalists.
Alright, so then this reads onthe storm plays a prank.
That night was pretty bad.
The storm mounted to a ragingblizzard, with the winter
(29:01):
darkness coming down.
The section of ice where Sweethad built his snow shelter broke
away from the main field.
Suddenly and without warning.
He heard the splintering noise,saw the crack starting to widen
into the dusk.
Only a few yards away, hegathered up his fish and his
precious axe and ran for a placewhere the pressure of the wind
(29:24):
still held the two masses of icetogether, grinding against each
other.
Even as he reached it, thecrevice opened ahead of him, but
it was only a couple of feetwide and he jumped across to the
temporary safety of the biggerflow.
Again he set to work to build ashelter with blocks of snow.
(29:45):
He basically spent another dayand night away.
He was out in the open lake nowand the storm had a chance to
vent its full force on the icefield.
Before midnight the field brokein two near him again,
compelling him to abandon hissnow shelter again and start a
(30:08):
new one.
Towards daybreak, the cold greweven more intense and now the
storm played a cruel prank.
The wind hauled around to thesouthwest, reversing the drift
of the ice field and sending itback, almost the way it had come
, toward the distant north shoreof the Lake Michigan.
In the darkness.
(30:28):
However, sweet was notimmediately aware of the shift.
The huge flow, still some twomiles across, went aground an
hour before daybreak withoutwarning.
There was sudden crunching anda thunder like of sound, and
directly ahead of Sweet the edgeof the ice rose out of the
(30:49):
water, curled back upon itselfoh my God and then came crashing
down in an avalanche of two tonblocks.
The entire field shuddered andshook and seemed about to
splinter into fragments, andSweet ran for his life away from
the spot where it wasthundering around.
Oh, wow, all right.
(31:16):
So at last Sweet was close totemporary safety, just 22 feet
away up the vertical concreteface of the crib lay, shelter
and fuel, food and survival.
Only 22 feet, four times hisown height, but it might as well
have been 22 miles, for theentire crib above the waterline
was encased in ice a foot thick,formed by freezing spray, and
(31:41):
the steel ladder bedded in theconcrete wall showed only a
bulge on the smooth, sheer faceof the ice.
Sweet knew the ladder had to bethere.
He located it in the gray lightof the stormy winter morning
and went to work with his axe.
He chopped away the ice as highas he could reach, standing on
the flow, freeing the rungs atthat time.
(32:03):
Then he stepped up on the firstone, hung on with one hand and
went on chopping with the other,chipping and whirring at the
flinty sheath that enclosed therest of the ladder.
Three hours from the time he cuthis first chip of ice away, he
was within three rungs of thetop three steps, less than a
(32:26):
yard, and he knew he wasn'tgoing to make it.
His feet were wooden stumps onwhich he could no longer trust
his weight.
His hands had long since lostall of his feeling.
They were so badly frozen thathe had to look to make sure his
fingers were hooked around therung and he could no longer keep
(32:47):
a grip on the axe.
Okay, the next time he droppedthe axe he wouldn't be able to
come back up the ladder.
He took a few short strokes andthe axe went clattering to the
ice below.
And the axe went clattering tothe ice below.
He climbed stiffly down thehuddle, I'm sorry.
(33:08):
He climbed stiffly down andhuddled on a block of ice to
rest.
Three hours later he finishedthe job and dragged himself,
more dead than alive, over theicy, treacherous lip of the crib
.
Alright, so let's just see howthis plays out.
(33:32):
Oh, it's just giving me anxiety.
So Louis Sweet crept on over theice all that day Again and
again.
He went ahead a few steps, satdown and rested, got up and
drove himself on.
At times he crawled on allfours.
(33:59):
This is a very long story.
I'm just trying to kind of dolike the pinpoints.
Okay, before morning he wasviolently ill, with cramps and
nausea, perhaps from lack offood, from the frozen milk he
had used with the coffee.
At daybreak he tried to drivehimself on toward Cross Village,
but he was too sick to stand.
He lay helpless in the shantyall day, monday through Monday
night, eating nothing.
(34:20):
Tuesday morning he summoned thelittle strength remaining to him
and started south once more,hobbling and crawling over the
rough ice of Sturgeon Bay.
It was quite a walk, but hemade it Near noon that day,
almost a week to the hour fromthe time the wind had set him
adrift on his ice flow.
He stumbled up the steep bluffat Cross Village and called to a
(35:04):
passing man for a hand.
Wow, that is holy shit.
That is an incredible story.
I cannot believe that mansurvived that.
Um, definitely old school man,because, no offense, but the men
(35:27):
here in 2025, I don't thinkthat they would survive that.
But anyways, I thought thesewere very interesting stories
and if you guys have anything toadd or you have your own
survival story, please let usknow.
You know that you can email usat ghost sisters 21, 24, at
Gmail.
You can find us on Facebook,tiktok, twitter, x, youtube.
I think I covered all them.
(35:47):
I say that every time, but,yeah, we definitely want to hear
from our listeners and thankyou guys for listening and tune
in for some more.
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