May 5, 2025 • 26 mins
Join Emily Jones and Holly Worthington as they unravel the Hansons’ jaw-dropping escape from Guatemala’s Pacaya Volcano in December 2008. What started as a festive family hike to toast marshmallows turned into a nightmare when molten lava and jagged boulders rained down, forcing Kaitlyn, her heroic brothers Adrian and Phil, and the rest to flee a deadly riptide of chaos. From a six-foot lava wall to a refrigerator-sized rock missing them by inches to brotherly bravery saving lives, the family was bloodied but bonded forever.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
A vast, desolate field of sharp lava rock stretched out
before them, with the black peak of the volcano towering
in its middle.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
So my brother went up to the top and looked
over the ledge and then he turned around.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
His eyes were big. He's like, we got me now.
Speaker 4 (00:15):
So we're all kind of looking around, and then we
see some tumbling orange balls coming down the side of
the mountain. We're like, holy how that doesn't seem good.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
And then all of a sudden, we hear screaming. My
brother behind us just said, just run, just run.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
This is the Miracle Files. I'm Emily Jones.
Speaker 5 (00:37):
And I'm Holly Worthington. We're two sisters who love a
captivating true story, but we're also seeking more light in
our lives.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
So we're on a mission to find and share unforgettable,
uplifting stories of God's miracles. We hope you'll join us
on this journey.
Speaker 5 (00:56):
Welcome back to the Miracle Files. We are so excited
to share this week's story with you.
Speaker 6 (01:01):
And if you.
Speaker 5 (01:01):
Remember clear back to our lion Attack episode, this one
also takes place in Guatemala, in like the same area
of Guatemala.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Yeah, and I thought that I was only gonna have
to say esquepulas in that episode, and it was so
hard to say.
Speaker 6 (01:18):
You managed to find another story where I have.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Heah again because this one also takes place in Las Guatemala.
Speaker 5 (01:25):
Wood always brings me a little bit of joy when
I can make you say hard to pronounce words.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
I've already got so much slack online because in our
Mystery Boat episode, which is our most viewed episode, apparently
I said lures instead of lures. There's so many people like,
come on, lady, who can't say lures.
Speaker 6 (01:46):
I'm like, forgive me. I don't no, I try. We
grew up in Idaho. I mean we do the best
we can. I don't know. Whatever. Anyway, let's jump in. Yeah,
let's do it.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
In December two thousand and eight, the Kaya volcano was
waking up. This volcano is a popular tourist spot in Guatemala,
as it's one of the only.
Speaker 6 (02:13):
Active volcanoes in the world where you can.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
Hike to the top camp and even toast marshmallows on
its vents. It sounds friendly enough, but Pakaya has a
dark side and a death toll. As the holiday season approached,
Pakaya began bubbling with activity sending out lava flot tendrils
and spewing minor eruptions from its mouth.
Speaker 6 (02:37):
At the same time, the.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Hanson family embarked on a journey to Guatemala. Caitlin Hansen,
along with her parents, older brother Adrian, and younger sister Carinn,
journey together to visit Caitlin's other brother, Philip.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Here's Caitlin, my second oldest brother, had just graduated college
and was living in a Sniblas, Guatemala, up doing mission
work for a year through a program with the university
that he graduated from. And he was living in a
monastery and working with the community, and then doing some
work with.
Speaker 7 (03:11):
An orphanage up in the foothills.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
So our whole family went to visit him around the holidays.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
After a few days in Esquipoolas, filled with sight seeing
and reconnecting with Philip, the Hansoon family decided to venture
to Antiqua, a city renowned for its colonial architecture.
Speaker 6 (03:30):
And stunning vistas.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
The air buzzed with excitement as they wandered through colonial markets,
sampled local delicacies, and soaked in the festive atmosphere. It
was here that Caitlin's brother Philip proposed an adventure that
would ignite their curiosity, a hike to explore the nearby
volcano Pekaya.
Speaker 7 (03:53):
And we were kind of just exploring.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
And one of the ideas that my brother had recommended
that he had heard other people experience was going to
a volcano outside of the city and you get to
like hike on the mechano, you get to see lava flows,
and so I was like, well, that seems really cool.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
The next morning, the Hansons got up before daybreak, filled
with anticipation. Philip had a mission partner whose family was
also visiting, so the two families joined a group of
tourists and boarded a rugged van that took them on
an hour long drive down winding roads and lush greenery.
As they neared Pakaya, its dark peak seemed to peer
(04:35):
down at them. The family chatted happily at the base,
unaware of the heat and pressure building inside the imposing volcano.
At the base, they were greeted by local guides. The
guides spoke little English, but Philip and his mission partner
were able to bridge the language gap. A small, thin
Guatemalan woman explained that she would be their guide, and
(04:58):
the Hanson family followed her to the trail.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
So the group that we were with was our family,
his missionary partner's family, and then a woman and her
nephew who are from Guatemala.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
The nephew being the youngest.
Speaker 7 (05:12):
One of our group, was probably between eight or ten
years old.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
The hike began with a steady ascent through dense foliage,
with the scent of damp earth mingling with the crisp
mountain air. The group noted that the climb was more
difficult than what they'd anticipated. Still, they marveled at the
beauty around them. Every so often they would stop and
look out over the green valleys below. As Caitlin and
(05:38):
her family pressed on, the trail grew steeper and even
more difficult to climb. After hiking for about two hours,
a vast, desolate field of sharp lava rock stretched out
before them, with the black peak of the volcano towering
in its middle. After walking through the jagged lava bed,
the guide started scrambling up the peak. Here's Caitlyn's brother Phil.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
You got out there. It's really whinny and crazy, and
all the volcanic rock were hiking on is super sharp.
It's getting really really steep. There's no trail anymore. We're
kind of walking like on all fours almost because it's
really steep. They're like, man, this is sharks. We're like
tucking our hands into our sleeves to try not to
get cut because their oxs are so sharp.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Caitlyn's heart raced as they scrambled upwards. The thrill of
adventure morphed into an unsettling feeling, a creeping sense of
danger that nod at her gut.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
And there was a lot of unstable little rock slides,
like the rocks would kind of slide up from one
of your feet, or someone would say from up above you.
They'd be like heads up and like rocks from tumbling
down at you. It was just it felt so like,
this doesn't feel secure.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
What the Hansen family and other hikers didn't know is
that only the day before there had been a lava
flow that had tumbled over the volcano and covered the
regular hiking path. Their guide was the first to try
to traverse a new path up the peak. She climbed adeptly,
but Caitlyn and her family felt unsettled. This path seemed
(07:15):
too rugged to be normal. Another small group caught up
with them. About fifty yards to their left, their group
was also trying to find a way up the peak. Suddenly,
chaos erupted. A loud thud echoed as a rock the
size of a basketball tumbled down the slope, narrowly missing
(07:35):
the nearby group of hikers. The two guides began to
yell at each other in rapid Spanish, their voices filled
with attension. The air grew thick with uncertainty, and Caitlyn
exchanged glances with her sister, both feeling an instinctual alarm.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
My sister and I, who are pretty close in age,
looked at each other and were leg this doesn't feel right.
My sister's like, yeah, I keep envisioning like a horror
movie where all of a sudden someone says run, and
we're supposed to somehow run down this mountain that we
can hardly even scramble up.
Speaker 7 (08:11):
Also, how are we supposed to get down?
Speaker 1 (08:13):
Caitlyn's brother Adrian, was at the front of the line,
just behind their guide. The guide reached a ledge that
lay below the top peak at the volcano. Caitlyn assumed
they would climb over the ledge and keep going. Instead,
the guide peered over the ledge and suddenly spun around.
Trying not to cause alarm. At first, she calmly suggested
(08:36):
everyone turn back. She then began scrambling quickly downhill.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
She's like, come on, let's go, let's go, let's go,
and be like, well, where are we going? So my
brother went up to the top and looked over the ledge,
and he said he saw what he would have described
as like a six foot tall wall of red and
orange molten lava with like a black face that was
all like crackly. Then he turned around, his eyes were big.
He's like, we got it out, and we're all like,
(09:02):
oh well, how like what was okay? How are we
supposed to get down?
Speaker 1 (09:07):
What Adrian had seen on the other side of the
ledge was exactly what Caitlin and Karin had feared, a
scene straight out of a nightmare. The guide, small and
agile and accustomed to climbing these rocks every day, raced
past them and was soon down the hill off in
the distance. She abandoned the Hansom family, the local woman
(09:27):
and her nephew, who had to find their own way down.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
So we decided to stop and starting making it way
back down. But you have to kind of pick your
way to really slow unstable rock. If you move your
own way, a piece will kind of tumble, maybe the
size of a basketball or something. But there are people below,
you usually have to be very careful only one person
kind of move at a time, because you might push
some rocks on somebody else. There were slowly making our
way down, and then all of a sudden, we hear whistles.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
All of the guides had whistles, and suddenly every guide
within the area began blowing their whistles with all of
their might. The chilling, shrill sound echoed throughout the mountainside.
The hikers knew this couldn't be a good sign, so.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
We're all just kind of looking around, and then we
see some tumbling orange balls coming down the side.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Of the mountain, and we're like, whoa.
Speaker 4 (10:17):
We looked to our right and there was a line
of tourists going up and sure enough, a ball of
lava is tumbling down right near them, with some of
them had to kind of move out from the side.
The ball of lava was probably on the side of
like a mini fridge, like a college dorm fridge. They
were like, holy cow, that doesn't seem good. So we
continue down, and then very soon after that, we hear
(10:38):
whistles and we're turning in this but we know what
that means, so we're turning arout looking and now the
lava is tumbling down directly in our past.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
And then all of a sudden, we hear screaming and
we turn and look, and these big chunks like baseball,
basketball and bigger lava chunks are starting to tumble over
the lad So we can't see where they're coming from
because it's like behind the top rim, but these lava
chunks just start randomly tumbling over the edge.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Now, a lurking lava flow pushing a pile of huge
rocks onto a group of hikers is bad enough, especially
when there's no easy way to retreat, But there's something
about these types of lava rocks that is even more frightening.
Not only are these rocks composed of boiling molten lava,
but nothing about them is uniform, with their jagged edges
(11:33):
and random shapes.
Speaker 7 (11:35):
They don't roll.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Instead, much like a football bounces, they hit the ground
and fly in completely haphazard directions. They break apart as
they land, sending smaller rocks and lava in all directions.
With more and more balls of lava cascading down toward
the hikers, the odds of someone getting severely injured or
(11:57):
even dying were increasing by the minute. The two families
and the aunt and nephew struggled to know which way
to move.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I turned and ran. My sister was next to me.
She was stumbling, so she fell. I tried the grabber.
My brother's behind us just said, just run, just run.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
The rocky mountain side was incredibly difficult to traverse. It
was impossible to help one another, as everyone had to
move quickly and go in single file. But Phil helped
in the best way he knew possible. He positioned himself
on a ridge where the rocks seemed to tumble to
one side or the other. He turned and began directing
(12:37):
people where to jump.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
And he turned and was looking up to the people
above him and saying, go left, go right.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
Because the thing is, every time you turn to run,
you don't know.
Speaker 7 (12:47):
What's coming from behind you.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
You can't see the rock that might be about to
smack you in the back of the head or take
out your feet. So it made it really hard, Like
you can't run down while looking over your shoulder, so
it was a very impossible situation to know how to navigate.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
When I looked up, I could.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
See my brother on the ridge trying to tell people
where to go. My oldest brother, who was the one
that was closest to the top who saw the lava wall.
He was at the top and trying to come down.
He was up and the little boy was kind of
up there near him because he wasn't a quick to
come down.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
While Adrian and the boy tried to find a way down,
Phil tried to help his sister Karn, who was struggling
as well. She began to panic and didn't dare move
at all.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
So my brother then is trying to get my sister down,
and he said, okay, you've got to go now, and
she started heading down. As right as she started heading
down off the ridge, another big tumbling rock came down.
He's like, no, great, come back, come back, come back,
climb climb, grin because this rock is coming right at her,
because you have to kind of pass across one of
(13:56):
the pathways of where some of the rocks were tumbling
in order to get down to say, and so.
Speaker 7 (14:01):
She tries to go down. He screams at her to
come back up.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
She scrambles back up to where he's at and then
she's like frozen.
Speaker 3 (14:07):
She's panicking.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Karenne dug her fingers into the spiky rocks, bracing herself
for the worst. The boulder thundered past her a narrow miss.
Phil exhaled a breath of relief his sister was safe,
untouched by the fiery rocks for now. That's when the
whistles started blowing again, and this time a gigantic lava
(14:31):
rock the size of a full size refrigerator crashed over
the ledge.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
We heard as autoist. As we turn and look up
the mountain, there's this huge boulder tumbling kind of chaotically down.
It's molten lava, so it is spraying and flinging smaller
pieces as it's tumbling, and it's directly in line with
my brother and then myself. I distinctly remember looking up
(14:58):
at my brother and and he's silhouetted in orange, and
I just see his body slwhat an orange And the orange,
of course is the orange blow from the lava.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
The lava rock wasn't just heading straight at Adrian. It
was also on the path of the young boy.
Speaker 7 (15:16):
And believe it or not.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
A photographer who was hiking the volcano at the time
caught this insane moment on his camera. In the picture,
you can see Adrian crouching in front of a giant,
glowing orange ball of molten lava, and you know this
isn't going to end well, except it did. Phil called
(15:38):
to his brother to jump. Heroically, Adrian didn't just jump,
He also pushed the young boy out of the way
and leaped backwards. The boulder passed right between the two
of them, taking the boy's shoe with it and burning
his foot. The boulder then diverted down over another ledge,
where the Hanson's mother had gone, but in this moment
(16:01):
of divine intervention, it somehow missed everyone. Only the boy
received a minor injury, but his life was spared. It
felt like an eternity of chaos, but finally the Hanson
family was able to regroup in a safe area, shaken
but alive. The relief washed over them like a warm blanket.
(16:25):
At the same time, the reality of their situation settled in.
The Hansens huddled together, bloodied and bruised, their bodies cut
and scraped from the jagged rocks, but they were all
accounted for the weight of what they had just survived
hung heavy in the air. The whole family came together
(16:45):
in a group, hug like.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
It just kind of was like, we're all here, We're
all safe, we're all alive, we're all walking. It just
felt like this safe bubble, which was an interesting sensation
after such panic.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
We were crying, we were consoling each other, everybody was talking,
everybody and just making sure we're all okay, provided comfort
and the next people were like, were you the ones
up there that was us?
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Never before had family met so much to the Hansens
then at that moment, as they circled one another with
gratitude and love. As they finally descended the mountain, they
encountered curious onlookers, eyes wide with disbelief at the sight
of the battered family, Caitlin felt an odd mix of
pride and humility. They had faced a primal fear and
(17:35):
emerged together. Each step down felt like a victory, a
testament to their resilience and the bonds that helped them together.
Upon reaching the town, they were met by medical personnel
in an emergency vehicle, but Caitlin was a nursing school
and her mother was a nurse. They were certain they
could treat the family's injuries themselves. That night, as they
(17:59):
gathered in their cramped hostel room, the atmosphere shifted from
frantic to reflective. Bandages were applied to their wounds, laughter
mingled with tears, and the gravity of their experience weighed
down heavily on their hearts. Caitlyn looked around at her family,
feeling an overwhelming sense of gratitude.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
And I remember that night, once everything was.
Speaker 7 (18:22):
Quiet and we laid down to go to sleep, I remember.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
The gratitude and feeling grateful to God for like all
being safe and okay and alive.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
As time has passed, Caitlin has pondered that day many
times and believes it was a miracle.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I would say the biggest miracle is that we were
all alive at the end, and that none of us
were seriously injured. How did none of the rocks hit somebody?
And if there wasn't a direct hit, how was it
not that someone got hit by the spewing of chunks
coming off, And just the miracle of like we're down,
we can't see what's behind us, and the timing of
(19:04):
my brother turning to look like if no one had
told Adrian to dive, he wouldn't have even known what
was about to hit it.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
You know, the miraculous timing of each rock, boulder, piece
of molten lava is a blessing Caitlin and her family
will forever be grateful for, and the fact that Adrian
was close enough and heroic enough to be aware of
another's needs was a miracle for the boy whose life
Adrian saved. Beyond these more obvious miracles was the way
(19:37):
this experience also forged an unbreakable bond among the members
of the Hansoon family. Sadly, Adrian passed away twelve years
after surviving the volcano incident.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
You know, Adrian could have died that day, or any
of us could have, but Adrian specifically, just because of
that moment that he almost got plowed over, well like
there was more he was meant to do before his time.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Caitlin and her family are grateful they got twelve more
years with their heroic brother, and they look back on
this experience as one they will never forget. Pa Kaya
volcano tested their limits, but it also revealed the profound
love and resilience of family and serves as a reminder
that life is a fragile gift meant to be cherished.
Speaker 5 (20:29):
We have mentioned this before, but our parents actually lived
in Guatemala for a year doing dental work for orphans,
and we visited them with our husbands, and on my
trip to Guatemala, we actually hiked this volcano. I've been there,
I've seen it. I've walked on that super sharp, hard
to walk on lava rock, and it's like walking on
(20:52):
big chunks of broken glass. Like, it's amazing to me
that this family didn't have more injuries than they had.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Yeah, you can see from the pictures that they sent
us their legs were super bloody and cut up just
trying to go down so fast. But at the end
of the day, I think they were just happy that
they walked away with nothing but.
Speaker 5 (21:10):
Bloody legs, right, Yeah, Yeah, I think they felt very
blessed that that's all that happened.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Yeah, it was incredible, and we actually looked into it.
I mean, it's not like what happened to them is
super common. It's not like this happens every day in Pekaya.
Speaker 5 (21:24):
Yeah, I mean it's a very active volcano, of course. Yeah,
but having huge lava rocks flying down at you is crazy.
That does not happen often.
Speaker 6 (21:35):
You didn't have lava rocks flying down on you while
you were there.
Speaker 5 (21:37):
No, no, we did. We actually did hear rumblings though,
Like we heard like some kind of booming sounds coming
out of the volcano. And in fact, we have a
picture like where we're you know, roasting our marshmallows on
the on the fence and suddenly we look up and
we're like terrified because we hear these rumblings from the volcano.
(21:59):
And we asked the guy, it is that normal, and
he's like, oh, yeah, no big deal. So it's kind
of funny. I'm sure they hear those rumblings all the time,
No big deal, right, But on this day things got
really out of hand.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
So, and it's so interesting to think about Guatemala, how
different it is than a lot of other countries where
you know, there are regulations like I don't imagine a
lot of places where you could actually go that close
to the volcano.
Speaker 5 (22:26):
No, we said that the whole time we were there. Yeah,
we kept saying they would never let us do this
back home.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
But yeah, it's like a completely different world there. We
did an excursion in Guatemala where we actually went whale watching.
And I've been on tons of whale watching trips before
and I kind of used to get on a dock
on this big boat they take you out and you
see whales. It was completely different in Guatemala. So we
got on this tiny little boat. It's just two guides,
(22:55):
our parents and Kurshion and me, and there's no dock
and it's in one of these little motor boats where
they have to pull the string like lawnmower just to
get out of run. God, we got twelve gautamall and
men all surrounding this little boat and they they would
we were going off into the ocean where these big
crashing waves. So what they would do is they'd have
(23:17):
six guys on each side.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Oh yeah, that's the Pacific Oceans. So those are big waves.
Speaker 6 (23:22):
They are big waves.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
Because you were on the parcific side, yes, and so
they would be like go go, go, go go, and
all twelve guys would start to push us out towards
the ocean and then they'd be like no, no, no,
no no, and then they'd back up and you'd see
this massive wave come crashing down and think that would
have been us, and so they had to time.
Speaker 6 (23:42):
It just right just to get us out of the relace.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
I mean, it's just they would never allow anything like
that here in the United States.
Speaker 6 (23:49):
It's just so funny. But it was so fun I mean,
it was an amazing trip.
Speaker 5 (23:54):
Yeah, we rode a raft and came and filled waters.
We went. I mean I could go on, I won't
go on, but it was an adventure of a lifetime.
Speaker 6 (24:02):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 5 (24:04):
So one of the things I wanted to talk about
before we close is that a lot of people probably
would call this luck. A lot of people might say
this family was just lucky that they didn't get hit
by any of those rocks, that things worked out.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Okay, So what would you say to that, Well, I mean,
you can say this was lucky, and I definitely respect
people who say that this was lucky, But I don't know.
I also think there's just more to it than that.
You could say God's involved in your life or you
don't have to believe that, but I believe that He
was involved in this situation.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (24:37):
I look at it like God is in control, and
I really believe God protected this family and because it
wasn't their time, to go and.
Speaker 6 (24:48):
This little boy.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
I mean the fact that Adrian was close enough to him,
the fact that Philip saw and was able to warn
them in time. I just think that there was enough
divine intervention there that you I just believe that God
was there.
Speaker 6 (25:02):
Yeah, I do two part of it, I do too.
Speaker 5 (25:05):
Yeah, they were truly heroes to those brothers, Yeah for sure.
And definitely God use them to save that little boy.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
Yeah. All right, Well, we want to thank you guys
for joining us today. Thank you so much for supporting
our podcasts. And God is so great and he provides
miracles in our lives every day, all the time, big
and small he does.
Speaker 5 (25:27):
And if you know anyone who could use these positive messages,
please share this podcast with them, and don't forget to
subscribe yourself so that you don't miss any episodes. Thank
you for joining us. If you have a miracle to share,
contact us at the Miracle files dot com or find
us on Facebook.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
We're now releasing multiple episodes each month, so subscribe on
your favorite podcast platform and YouTube for amazing video content
as well.
Speaker 5 (25:55):
Join us next time as we discover more of God's miracles,
and don't forget to look for his light in your
own lives.
A vast, desolate field of sharp lava rock stretched out
before them, with the black peak of the volcano towering
in its middle.
Speaker 2 (00:09):
So my brother went up to the top and looked
over the ledge and then he turned around.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
His eyes were big. He's like, we got me now.
Speaker 4 (00:15):
So we're all kind of looking around, and then we
see some tumbling orange balls coming down the side of
the mountain. We're like, holy how that doesn't seem good.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
And then all of a sudden, we hear screaming. My
brother behind us just said, just run, just run.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
This is the Miracle Files. I'm Emily Jones.
Speaker 5 (00:37):
And I'm Holly Worthington. We're two sisters who love a
captivating true story, but we're also seeking more light in
our lives.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
So we're on a mission to find and share unforgettable,
uplifting stories of God's miracles. We hope you'll join us
on this journey.
Speaker 5 (00:56):
Welcome back to the Miracle Files. We are so excited
to share this week's story with you.
Speaker 6 (01:01):
And if you.
Speaker 5 (01:01):
Remember clear back to our lion Attack episode, this one
also takes place in Guatemala, in like the same area
of Guatemala.
Speaker 1 (01:10):
Yeah, and I thought that I was only gonna have
to say esquepulas in that episode, and it was so
hard to say.
Speaker 6 (01:18):
You managed to find another story where I have.
Speaker 1 (01:21):
Heah again because this one also takes place in Las Guatemala.
Speaker 5 (01:25):
Wood always brings me a little bit of joy when
I can make you say hard to pronounce words.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
I've already got so much slack online because in our
Mystery Boat episode, which is our most viewed episode, apparently
I said lures instead of lures. There's so many people like,
come on, lady, who can't say lures.
Speaker 6 (01:46):
I'm like, forgive me. I don't no, I try. We
grew up in Idaho. I mean we do the best
we can. I don't know. Whatever. Anyway, let's jump in. Yeah,
let's do it.
Speaker 1 (02:03):
In December two thousand and eight, the Kaya volcano was
waking up. This volcano is a popular tourist spot in Guatemala,
as it's one of the only.
Speaker 6 (02:13):
Active volcanoes in the world where you can.
Speaker 1 (02:15):
Hike to the top camp and even toast marshmallows on
its vents. It sounds friendly enough, but Pakaya has a
dark side and a death toll. As the holiday season approached,
Pakaya began bubbling with activity sending out lava flot tendrils
and spewing minor eruptions from its mouth.
Speaker 6 (02:37):
At the same time, the.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Hanson family embarked on a journey to Guatemala. Caitlin Hansen,
along with her parents, older brother Adrian, and younger sister Carinn,
journey together to visit Caitlin's other brother, Philip.
Speaker 2 (02:52):
Here's Caitlin, my second oldest brother, had just graduated college
and was living in a Sniblas, Guatemala, up doing mission
work for a year through a program with the university
that he graduated from. And he was living in a
monastery and working with the community, and then doing some
work with.
Speaker 7 (03:11):
An orphanage up in the foothills.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
So our whole family went to visit him around the holidays.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
After a few days in Esquipoolas, filled with sight seeing
and reconnecting with Philip, the Hansoon family decided to venture
to Antiqua, a city renowned for its colonial architecture.
Speaker 6 (03:30):
And stunning vistas.
Speaker 1 (03:32):
The air buzzed with excitement as they wandered through colonial markets,
sampled local delicacies, and soaked in the festive atmosphere. It
was here that Caitlin's brother Philip proposed an adventure that
would ignite their curiosity, a hike to explore the nearby
volcano Pekaya.
Speaker 7 (03:53):
And we were kind of just exploring.
Speaker 2 (03:55):
And one of the ideas that my brother had recommended
that he had heard other people experience was going to
a volcano outside of the city and you get to
like hike on the mechano, you get to see lava flows,
and so I was like, well, that seems really cool.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
The next morning, the Hansons got up before daybreak, filled
with anticipation. Philip had a mission partner whose family was
also visiting, so the two families joined a group of
tourists and boarded a rugged van that took them on
an hour long drive down winding roads and lush greenery.
As they neared Pakaya, its dark peak seemed to peer
(04:35):
down at them. The family chatted happily at the base,
unaware of the heat and pressure building inside the imposing volcano.
At the base, they were greeted by local guides. The
guides spoke little English, but Philip and his mission partner
were able to bridge the language gap. A small, thin
Guatemalan woman explained that she would be their guide, and
(04:58):
the Hanson family followed her to the trail.
Speaker 2 (05:02):
So the group that we were with was our family,
his missionary partner's family, and then a woman and her
nephew who are from Guatemala.
Speaker 3 (05:11):
The nephew being the youngest.
Speaker 7 (05:12):
One of our group, was probably between eight or ten
years old.
Speaker 1 (05:17):
The hike began with a steady ascent through dense foliage,
with the scent of damp earth mingling with the crisp
mountain air. The group noted that the climb was more
difficult than what they'd anticipated. Still, they marveled at the
beauty around them. Every so often they would stop and
look out over the green valleys below. As Caitlin and
(05:38):
her family pressed on, the trail grew steeper and even
more difficult to climb. After hiking for about two hours,
a vast, desolate field of sharp lava rock stretched out
before them, with the black peak of the volcano towering
in its middle. After walking through the jagged lava bed,
the guide started scrambling up the peak. Here's Caitlyn's brother Phil.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
You got out there. It's really whinny and crazy, and
all the volcanic rock were hiking on is super sharp.
It's getting really really steep. There's no trail anymore. We're
kind of walking like on all fours almost because it's
really steep. They're like, man, this is sharks. We're like
tucking our hands into our sleeves to try not to
get cut because their oxs are so sharp.
Speaker 1 (06:23):
Caitlyn's heart raced as they scrambled upwards. The thrill of
adventure morphed into an unsettling feeling, a creeping sense of
danger that nod at her gut.
Speaker 2 (06:35):
And there was a lot of unstable little rock slides,
like the rocks would kind of slide up from one
of your feet, or someone would say from up above you.
They'd be like heads up and like rocks from tumbling
down at you. It was just it felt so like,
this doesn't feel secure.
Speaker 1 (06:52):
What the Hansen family and other hikers didn't know is
that only the day before there had been a lava
flow that had tumbled over the volcano and covered the
regular hiking path. Their guide was the first to try
to traverse a new path up the peak. She climbed adeptly,
but Caitlyn and her family felt unsettled. This path seemed
(07:15):
too rugged to be normal. Another small group caught up
with them. About fifty yards to their left, their group
was also trying to find a way up the peak. Suddenly,
chaos erupted. A loud thud echoed as a rock the
size of a basketball tumbled down the slope, narrowly missing
(07:35):
the nearby group of hikers. The two guides began to
yell at each other in rapid Spanish, their voices filled
with attension. The air grew thick with uncertainty, and Caitlyn
exchanged glances with her sister, both feeling an instinctual alarm.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
My sister and I, who are pretty close in age,
looked at each other and were leg this doesn't feel right.
My sister's like, yeah, I keep envisioning like a horror
movie where all of a sudden someone says run, and
we're supposed to somehow run down this mountain that we
can hardly even scramble up.
Speaker 7 (08:11):
Also, how are we supposed to get down?
Speaker 1 (08:13):
Caitlyn's brother Adrian, was at the front of the line,
just behind their guide. The guide reached a ledge that
lay below the top peak at the volcano. Caitlyn assumed
they would climb over the ledge and keep going. Instead,
the guide peered over the ledge and suddenly spun around.
Trying not to cause alarm. At first, she calmly suggested
(08:36):
everyone turn back. She then began scrambling quickly downhill.
Speaker 2 (08:41):
She's like, come on, let's go, let's go, let's go,
and be like, well, where are we going? So my
brother went up to the top and looked over the ledge,
and he said he saw what he would have described
as like a six foot tall wall of red and
orange molten lava with like a black face that was
all like crackly. Then he turned around, his eyes were big.
He's like, we got it out, and we're all like,
(09:02):
oh well, how like what was okay? How are we
supposed to get down?
Speaker 1 (09:07):
What Adrian had seen on the other side of the
ledge was exactly what Caitlin and Karin had feared, a
scene straight out of a nightmare. The guide, small and
agile and accustomed to climbing these rocks every day, raced
past them and was soon down the hill off in
the distance. She abandoned the Hansom family, the local woman
(09:27):
and her nephew, who had to find their own way down.
Speaker 4 (09:31):
So we decided to stop and starting making it way
back down. But you have to kind of pick your
way to really slow unstable rock. If you move your
own way, a piece will kind of tumble, maybe the
size of a basketball or something. But there are people below,
you usually have to be very careful only one person
kind of move at a time, because you might push
some rocks on somebody else. There were slowly making our
way down, and then all of a sudden, we hear whistles.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
All of the guides had whistles, and suddenly every guide
within the area began blowing their whistles with all of
their might. The chilling, shrill sound echoed throughout the mountainside.
The hikers knew this couldn't be a good sign, so.
Speaker 4 (10:10):
We're all just kind of looking around, and then we
see some tumbling orange balls coming down the side.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Of the mountain, and we're like, whoa.
Speaker 4 (10:17):
We looked to our right and there was a line
of tourists going up and sure enough, a ball of
lava is tumbling down right near them, with some of
them had to kind of move out from the side.
The ball of lava was probably on the side of
like a mini fridge, like a college dorm fridge. They
were like, holy cow, that doesn't seem good. So we
continue down, and then very soon after that, we hear
(10:38):
whistles and we're turning in this but we know what
that means, so we're turning arout looking and now the
lava is tumbling down directly in our past.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
And then all of a sudden, we hear screaming and
we turn and look, and these big chunks like baseball,
basketball and bigger lava chunks are starting to tumble over
the lad So we can't see where they're coming from
because it's like behind the top rim, but these lava
chunks just start randomly tumbling over the edge.
Speaker 1 (11:10):
Now, a lurking lava flow pushing a pile of huge
rocks onto a group of hikers is bad enough, especially
when there's no easy way to retreat, But there's something
about these types of lava rocks that is even more frightening.
Not only are these rocks composed of boiling molten lava,
but nothing about them is uniform, with their jagged edges
(11:33):
and random shapes.
Speaker 7 (11:35):
They don't roll.
Speaker 1 (11:36):
Instead, much like a football bounces, they hit the ground
and fly in completely haphazard directions. They break apart as
they land, sending smaller rocks and lava in all directions.
With more and more balls of lava cascading down toward
the hikers, the odds of someone getting severely injured or
(11:57):
even dying were increasing by the minute. The two families
and the aunt and nephew struggled to know which way
to move.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
I turned and ran. My sister was next to me.
She was stumbling, so she fell. I tried the grabber.
My brother's behind us just said, just run, just run.
Speaker 1 (12:16):
The rocky mountain side was incredibly difficult to traverse. It
was impossible to help one another, as everyone had to
move quickly and go in single file. But Phil helped
in the best way he knew possible. He positioned himself
on a ridge where the rocks seemed to tumble to
one side or the other. He turned and began directing
(12:37):
people where to jump.
Speaker 2 (12:39):
And he turned and was looking up to the people
above him and saying, go left, go right.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
Because the thing is, every time you turn to run,
you don't know.
Speaker 7 (12:47):
What's coming from behind you.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
You can't see the rock that might be about to
smack you in the back of the head or take
out your feet. So it made it really hard, Like
you can't run down while looking over your shoulder, so
it was a very impossible situation to know how to navigate.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
When I looked up, I could.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
See my brother on the ridge trying to tell people
where to go. My oldest brother, who was the one
that was closest to the top who saw the lava wall.
He was at the top and trying to come down.
He was up and the little boy was kind of
up there near him because he wasn't a quick to
come down.
Speaker 1 (13:24):
While Adrian and the boy tried to find a way down,
Phil tried to help his sister Karn, who was struggling
as well. She began to panic and didn't dare move
at all.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
So my brother then is trying to get my sister down,
and he said, okay, you've got to go now, and
she started heading down. As right as she started heading
down off the ridge, another big tumbling rock came down.
He's like, no, great, come back, come back, come back,
climb climb, grin because this rock is coming right at her,
because you have to kind of pass across one of
(13:56):
the pathways of where some of the rocks were tumbling
in order to get down to say, and so.
Speaker 7 (14:01):
She tries to go down. He screams at her to
come back up.
Speaker 2 (14:03):
She scrambles back up to where he's at and then
she's like frozen.
Speaker 3 (14:07):
She's panicking.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
Karenne dug her fingers into the spiky rocks, bracing herself
for the worst. The boulder thundered past her a narrow miss.
Phil exhaled a breath of relief his sister was safe,
untouched by the fiery rocks for now. That's when the
whistles started blowing again, and this time a gigantic lava
(14:31):
rock the size of a full size refrigerator crashed over
the ledge.
Speaker 4 (14:37):
We heard as autoist. As we turn and look up
the mountain, there's this huge boulder tumbling kind of chaotically down.
It's molten lava, so it is spraying and flinging smaller
pieces as it's tumbling, and it's directly in line with
my brother and then myself. I distinctly remember looking up
(14:58):
at my brother and and he's silhouetted in orange, and
I just see his body slwhat an orange And the orange,
of course is the orange blow from the lava.
Speaker 1 (15:10):
The lava rock wasn't just heading straight at Adrian. It
was also on the path of the young boy.
Speaker 7 (15:16):
And believe it or not.
Speaker 1 (15:18):
A photographer who was hiking the volcano at the time
caught this insane moment on his camera. In the picture,
you can see Adrian crouching in front of a giant,
glowing orange ball of molten lava, and you know this
isn't going to end well, except it did. Phil called
(15:38):
to his brother to jump. Heroically, Adrian didn't just jump,
He also pushed the young boy out of the way
and leaped backwards. The boulder passed right between the two
of them, taking the boy's shoe with it and burning
his foot. The boulder then diverted down over another ledge,
where the Hanson's mother had gone, but in this moment
(16:01):
of divine intervention, it somehow missed everyone. Only the boy
received a minor injury, but his life was spared. It
felt like an eternity of chaos, but finally the Hanson
family was able to regroup in a safe area, shaken
but alive. The relief washed over them like a warm blanket.
(16:25):
At the same time, the reality of their situation settled in.
The Hansens huddled together, bloodied and bruised, their bodies cut
and scraped from the jagged rocks, but they were all
accounted for the weight of what they had just survived
hung heavy in the air. The whole family came together
(16:45):
in a group, hug like.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
It just kind of was like, we're all here, We're
all safe, we're all alive, we're all walking. It just
felt like this safe bubble, which was an interesting sensation
after such panic.
Speaker 4 (17:00):
We were crying, we were consoling each other, everybody was talking,
everybody and just making sure we're all okay, provided comfort
and the next people were like, were you the ones
up there that was us?
Speaker 1 (17:11):
Never before had family met so much to the Hansens
then at that moment, as they circled one another with
gratitude and love. As they finally descended the mountain, they
encountered curious onlookers, eyes wide with disbelief at the sight
of the battered family, Caitlin felt an odd mix of
pride and humility. They had faced a primal fear and
(17:35):
emerged together. Each step down felt like a victory, a
testament to their resilience and the bonds that helped them together.
Upon reaching the town, they were met by medical personnel
in an emergency vehicle, but Caitlin was a nursing school
and her mother was a nurse. They were certain they
could treat the family's injuries themselves. That night, as they
(17:59):
gathered in their cramped hostel room, the atmosphere shifted from
frantic to reflective. Bandages were applied to their wounds, laughter
mingled with tears, and the gravity of their experience weighed
down heavily on their hearts. Caitlyn looked around at her family,
feeling an overwhelming sense of gratitude.
Speaker 3 (18:20):
And I remember that night, once everything was.
Speaker 7 (18:22):
Quiet and we laid down to go to sleep, I remember.
Speaker 2 (18:26):
The gratitude and feeling grateful to God for like all
being safe and okay and alive.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
As time has passed, Caitlin has pondered that day many
times and believes it was a miracle.
Speaker 2 (18:41):
I would say the biggest miracle is that we were
all alive at the end, and that none of us
were seriously injured. How did none of the rocks hit somebody?
And if there wasn't a direct hit, how was it
not that someone got hit by the spewing of chunks
coming off, And just the miracle of like we're down,
we can't see what's behind us, and the timing of
(19:04):
my brother turning to look like if no one had
told Adrian to dive, he wouldn't have even known what
was about to hit it.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
You know, the miraculous timing of each rock, boulder, piece
of molten lava is a blessing Caitlin and her family
will forever be grateful for, and the fact that Adrian
was close enough and heroic enough to be aware of
another's needs was a miracle for the boy whose life
Adrian saved. Beyond these more obvious miracles was the way
(19:37):
this experience also forged an unbreakable bond among the members
of the Hansoon family. Sadly, Adrian passed away twelve years
after surviving the volcano incident.
Speaker 2 (19:50):
You know, Adrian could have died that day, or any
of us could have, but Adrian specifically, just because of
that moment that he almost got plowed over, well like
there was more he was meant to do before his time.
Speaker 1 (20:04):
Caitlin and her family are grateful they got twelve more
years with their heroic brother, and they look back on
this experience as one they will never forget. Pa Kaya
volcano tested their limits, but it also revealed the profound
love and resilience of family and serves as a reminder
that life is a fragile gift meant to be cherished.
Speaker 5 (20:29):
We have mentioned this before, but our parents actually lived
in Guatemala for a year doing dental work for orphans,
and we visited them with our husbands, and on my
trip to Guatemala, we actually hiked this volcano. I've been there,
I've seen it. I've walked on that super sharp, hard
to walk on lava rock, and it's like walking on
(20:52):
big chunks of broken glass. Like, it's amazing to me
that this family didn't have more injuries than they had.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Yeah, you can see from the pictures that they sent
us their legs were super bloody and cut up just
trying to go down so fast. But at the end
of the day, I think they were just happy that
they walked away with nothing but.
Speaker 5 (21:10):
Bloody legs, right, Yeah, Yeah, I think they felt very
blessed that that's all that happened.
Speaker 1 (21:15):
Yeah, it was incredible, and we actually looked into it.
I mean, it's not like what happened to them is
super common. It's not like this happens every day in Pekaya.
Speaker 5 (21:24):
Yeah, I mean it's a very active volcano, of course. Yeah,
but having huge lava rocks flying down at you is crazy.
That does not happen often.
Speaker 6 (21:35):
You didn't have lava rocks flying down on you while
you were there.
Speaker 5 (21:37):
No, no, we did. We actually did hear rumblings though,
Like we heard like some kind of booming sounds coming
out of the volcano. And in fact, we have a
picture like where we're you know, roasting our marshmallows on
the on the fence and suddenly we look up and
we're like terrified because we hear these rumblings from the volcano.
(21:59):
And we asked the guy, it is that normal, and
he's like, oh, yeah, no big deal. So it's kind
of funny. I'm sure they hear those rumblings all the time,
No big deal, right, But on this day things got
really out of hand.
Speaker 1 (22:13):
So, and it's so interesting to think about Guatemala, how
different it is than a lot of other countries where
you know, there are regulations like I don't imagine a
lot of places where you could actually go that close
to the volcano.
Speaker 5 (22:26):
No, we said that the whole time we were there. Yeah,
we kept saying they would never let us do this
back home.
Speaker 1 (22:32):
But yeah, it's like a completely different world there. We
did an excursion in Guatemala where we actually went whale watching.
And I've been on tons of whale watching trips before
and I kind of used to get on a dock
on this big boat they take you out and you
see whales. It was completely different in Guatemala. So we
got on this tiny little boat. It's just two guides,
(22:55):
our parents and Kurshion and me, and there's no dock
and it's in one of these little motor boats where
they have to pull the string like lawnmower just to
get out of run. God, we got twelve gautamall and
men all surrounding this little boat and they they would
we were going off into the ocean where these big
crashing waves. So what they would do is they'd have
(23:17):
six guys on each side.
Speaker 5 (23:18):
Oh yeah, that's the Pacific Oceans. So those are big waves.
Speaker 6 (23:22):
They are big waves.
Speaker 1 (23:23):
Because you were on the parcific side, yes, and so
they would be like go go, go, go go, and
all twelve guys would start to push us out towards
the ocean and then they'd be like no, no, no,
no no, and then they'd back up and you'd see
this massive wave come crashing down and think that would
have been us, and so they had to time.
Speaker 6 (23:42):
It just right just to get us out of the relace.
Speaker 1 (23:45):
I mean, it's just they would never allow anything like
that here in the United States.
Speaker 6 (23:49):
It's just so funny. But it was so fun I mean,
it was an amazing trip.
Speaker 5 (23:54):
Yeah, we rode a raft and came and filled waters.
We went. I mean I could go on, I won't
go on, but it was an adventure of a lifetime.
Speaker 6 (24:02):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 5 (24:04):
So one of the things I wanted to talk about
before we close is that a lot of people probably
would call this luck. A lot of people might say
this family was just lucky that they didn't get hit
by any of those rocks, that things worked out.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Okay, So what would you say to that, Well, I mean,
you can say this was lucky, and I definitely respect
people who say that this was lucky, But I don't know.
I also think there's just more to it than that.
You could say God's involved in your life or you
don't have to believe that, but I believe that He
was involved in this situation.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (24:37):
I look at it like God is in control, and
I really believe God protected this family and because it
wasn't their time, to go and.
Speaker 6 (24:48):
This little boy.
Speaker 3 (24:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
I mean the fact that Adrian was close enough to him,
the fact that Philip saw and was able to warn
them in time. I just think that there was enough
divine intervention there that you I just believe that God
was there.
Speaker 6 (25:02):
Yeah, I do two part of it, I do too.
Speaker 5 (25:05):
Yeah, they were truly heroes to those brothers, Yeah for sure.
And definitely God use them to save that little boy.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
Yeah. All right, Well, we want to thank you guys
for joining us today. Thank you so much for supporting
our podcasts. And God is so great and he provides
miracles in our lives every day, all the time, big
and small he does.
Speaker 5 (25:27):
And if you know anyone who could use these positive messages,
please share this podcast with them, and don't forget to
subscribe yourself so that you don't miss any episodes. Thank
you for joining us. If you have a miracle to share,
contact us at the Miracle files dot com or find
us on Facebook.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
We're now releasing multiple episodes each month, so subscribe on
your favorite podcast platform and YouTube for amazing video content
as well.
Speaker 5 (25:55):
Join us next time as we discover more of God's miracles,
and don't forget to look for his light in your
own lives.
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