April 17, 2025 • 25 mins
This podcast episode embarks on an exploration of the extraordinary, presenting two compelling narratives that intertwine the themes of survival and unexpected fate. The first story recounts the harrowing experience of Juliane Koepke, a young girl who, after surviving a plane crash in the Amazon rainforest, navigates a treacherous journey toward safety over the course of ten grueling days. Her remarkable resilience and instinctive connection to the wilderness illuminate the thin line between life and death. The second tale, known as the Poisoned Cake Affair, unveils a darkly ironic twist of fate, wherein a woman's vengeful plan to poison her husband inadvertently saves a stranger's life. Both narratives compel us to reflect on the unpredictable nature of existence and the profound mysteries that lie within our reality. Join us as we delve into these stories that challenge our understanding of survival and consequence.
00:00 Welcome to the Enigmatic Journey
01:01 Introduction to Today's Stories
01:24 The Girl Who Fell from the Clouds
02:21 The Crash and Survival
05:06 Julianne's Struggle in the Jungle
11:59 Rescue and Aftermath
14:55 The Poisoned Cake Affair
17:20 Marjorie's Plan and Kevin's Fate
20:16 The Unexpected Consequences
25:03 Conclusion and Reflections
These two narratives intertwine to present a compelling examination of the human experience, characterized by survival, resilience, and the unpredictable nature of life. Through Juliane's harrowing survival against the odds and Marjorie's misguided attempt at vengeance, the episode invites listeners to reflect upon the duality of human nature—the capacity for both destruction and profound empathy. Each tale stands alone in its thematic exploration yet resonates with overarching motifs of fate, choice, and the intricate threads that connect individuals within the tapestry of existence. As the stories unfold, they challenge the audience to contemplate the nature of reality, the essence of survival, and the profound impacts of our choices, ultimately culminating in a rich narrative experience that lingers long after the final words are spoken.
Takeaways:
- This episode explores the extraordinary tale of survival experienced by Julianne Koepke after her plane crash in the Amazon jungle.
- The second story, known as the Poisoned Cake Affair, intricately intertwines elements of attempted murder and unforeseen fate in a domestic setting.
- Julianne's harrowing journey illustrates the resilience of the human spirit amidst the relentless challenges presented by nature.
- Marjorie Evans' descent into desperation and her misguided attempt at vengeance reveals the complexities of human relationships and moral dilemmas.
- The podcast episodes are released bi-weekly, showcasing various stories that delve into the enigmatic and the inexplicable.
- Both narratives serve as profound reminders of the unpredictable nature of life and the thin line between survival and demise.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
Imagine a world teetering onthe edge of the familiar, a place
where the fabric of theeveryday begins to unravel, revealing
glimpses of the extraordinarylurking beneath.
You're about to embark on ajourney into the enigmatic, where
the peculiar and theperplexing intertwine, where every
(00:22):
tale twists the mind and tugsat the spirit.
It's a descent into thestrange, the mysterious, and the
unexplained.
This is when Reality Phrasewelcome to the Podcast.
New episodes are publishedevery Monday and Thursday, and when
Reality Phrase is availableeverywhere, fine podcasts are found.
(00:46):
Before we move on, please hitthat Follow or Subscribe button and
turn on all the reminders soyou're alerted when new episodes
are released.
Thank you for listening.
Now let's get to the stories.
Today's episode contains two stories.
First up is the Girl who Fellfrom the Clouds, a remarkable tale
(01:09):
of survival in the Amazon jungle.
And the second story of theday is the Poisoned Cake Affair,
the unbelievable story of awife who set out to murder her husband
but saved a stranger instead.
A girl named Julianne Koepke,17 years old, a passenger on a flight
(01:29):
bound for nowhere, a speck ofhumanity caught in the gears of fate.
It's December 24, 1971, whenshe boards a plane as fragile as
a promise, soaring over theendless green void of the Peruvian
Amazon.
What begins as a holidaypilgrimage to her father's jungle
outpost ends in a thunderclapand a descent into a world where
(01:54):
survival is not a gift but a riddle.
Now you're invited to join heron a journey through the shadows
of the wild, where the linebetween life and death blurs and
a human spirit is tested in atrial of nature's own design.
You're about to enter a placewhere reality frays.
(02:16):
This is the story of the girlwho Fell from the clouds.
The sky churned like a woundedbeast as Lanza Flight 508 fought
its way through the storm.
Julianne Koepke sat beside hermother, her forehead pressed to the
window's cool glass, watchinglightning fracture the horizon.
(02:36):
Her mother, Maria, clutched atattered notebook filled with an
ornithologist's sketches ofbirds she was studying.
They were flying from Lima toPucalpa, chasing a Christmas reunion
with Julianne's father, azoologist living at the Panguana
research station deep in the Amazon.
The cabin hummed with thevoices of 85 passengers, children
(02:58):
giggling over candy canes, apriest murmuring blessings, a young
couple whispering plans for aholiday tryst.
Julianne fidgeted in hersleeveless blue dress, a gift from
her mother.
Its hem brushed her knees andshe clutched a small bag of boiled
candies, their sweetness atether to the festive promise of
(03:19):
the holiday.
The plane shuddered, a rippleof unease threading through the chatter.
Turbulence, maria said, herGerman accent clipped, her hazel
eyes flicking to the wing.
Juliane nodded, swallowing theknot in her throat.
But the storm's growl grewlouder, more, more insistent.
(03:40):
Then it struck, a flash sobright it burned her retinas, a thunderclap
that shook her bones.
When lightning hit the rightwing, the plane's skin was breached
by the blast and a fuel lineruptured, high pressure aviation
glass igniting into a fiery plume.
The cabin erupted in chaos.
Lights flickered and died.
(04:01):
Luggage tumbled like stones inan avalanche from the overhead, and
screams rent the air.
The floor beneath her buckled,the plane's spine snapping midair.
A force beyond reckoningyanked Julianne's seat from its mounting,
her hand torn from her mother's.
The belt held her impossiblytight, as still strapped in, she
(04:24):
was flung through a gapinghole torn in the fuselage and into
the void.
The wind screamed, a bansheetearing at her ears as she spun through
darkness 10,000ft above the earth.
Julianne tried to scream asshe plummeted toward the rainforest
below, a jagged sea of green,but there was no breath in her lungs.
(04:46):
She crashed through thecanopy, branches snapping like gunfire,
thick leaves slashing herskin, her seat cushioning the fall
just enough to spare her life.
The impact slammed her intothe muddy earth and the world went
black, the jungle's breath thelast thing she felt.
Julianne awoke to rain, a softstaccato on her face, pulling her
(05:10):
from the abyss.
Pain roared through her.
Her collarbone was a jaggedache broken into plunge.
A gash above her right eyewept blood into her hair.
Her right arm hung limp,swollen and bruised.
She pushed herself up, gaspingas her bare foot sank into the sodden
ground, One sandal lost, hertoes curled against the cold mud.
(05:36):
Her glasses were gone, leavingthe jungle a blurred mosaic of greens
and shadows.
The air was thick withhumidity, alive with the whine of
insects and the distant criesof parrots.
She called out for her mother,but her voice cracked, a fragile
plea lost in the vastness.
The jungle pressed back, heavyand unyielding.
(05:59):
Around her was splinteredwreckage strewn beyond sight.
Bodies sat strapped into seatsthat hung high in the trees like
a macabre Christmas display.
Other pieces of the planelittered the jungle floor.
With a gasp of horror,Julianne turned away from a leg that
had been severed just belowthe hip.
She stumbled away from it,every step agony.
(06:23):
Her dress clung to her, tornand soaked, its blue faded to a muddy
smear.
A practical girl she recognized.
She was alone, but she wasalso a girl shaped by the wild, raised
in Panguana's embrace,tracking frogs with her father, sketching
birds with her mother.
Their voices echoed now, alifeline in the chaos.
(06:46):
Water is your map.
Find a stream, follow it downstream.
It leads to life.
She turned, her bare footbleeding against a root, and took
her first step, resolvehardening in her chest.
The first day was a baptism in pain.
Her broken collarbone joltedwith every movement, a white hot
(07:08):
spike.
She bit her lip to endure.
The gash on her foreheadthrobbed, sweat and blood mingling
in a bitter sting.
The jungle loomed, its canopya vaulted ceiling filtering sunlight
into a dim emerald glow.
Vines coiled like traps,snagging her legs while bromelaides
dripped water she licked fromtheir cups.
(07:31):
She found a trickle of a stream.
By midday, its surface cloudedwith silt.
Kneeling, she drank, thecoolness cutting through her parched
throat.
She waded in the water ankledeep, her one sandal slapping against
the stones as the currentbecame her guide.
Night fell hard, thetemperature plummeting as the jungle
(07:53):
sang its nocturnal hymn.
How her monkeys roared, theircries a primal wail that shivered
down her spine.
She curled beneath a buttressroot, its gnarled arms a frail shield.
The ground was spongy, seepingthrough her dress, and mosquitoes
swarmed there, bites a redconstellation on her arms.
(08:14):
Sleep came in shards,fractured by visions.
The plane's fire, her mother'shands slipping away, the endless
fall.
She woke to small beetlesburrowing into the cuts on her arm,
their bodies wriggling in her flesh.
Revulsion churned her gut, butshe had no knife, no strength to
(08:34):
dig them out.
You're alive, she whispered,her breath a faint cloud in the dawn's
chill.
Keep moving.
Days bled into a relentless march.
Her stomach was a hollow drum,echoing with hunger.
She rationed her steps,resting when dizziness spun her vision,
the world a watery smearwithout her glasses.
(08:56):
The stream widened, its bankslick with clay, and she followed
it, her bare foot raw fromthorns, her sandal caked in mud.
The jungle was a crucible,testing her with every breath.
A caiman watched her from theshallows, its eyes glinting like
coins, jaws parting in asilent threat.
(09:18):
She froze, heart hammering,until it sank beneath the surface,
leaving ripples she dared not cross.
Too soon later, a jaguar'sgrowl rumbled through the trees and
a Shadow paced her from justbeyond sight.
She pressed on, fear a bittertaste she swallowed down.
(09:38):
By day five, her body was a ruin.
The beetles burrowed deeper,their itch a maddening pulse.
Her skin blistered from thesun, peeled by vines, and her cuts
festered in the humid air.
She stumbled on more wreckage.
A suitcase burst open,spilling a child's doll and a sodden
bottle Bible into the mud.
(09:59):
Her chest tightened.
Was it her mother's?
She knelt, hands trembling,but the bag was not Maria's satchel.
She turned away, tears burningher eyes, and kept walking, the river
her only compass.
Day eight brought a grimmerfind, a section of the plains.
Tail vines were alreadyclaiming it for their own, weaving
(10:21):
through its metal ribs.
Within, soon to be lostforever, were three bodies still
strapped to seats.
Their faces were cloaked indecay, flies buzzing.
A dirge.
Momma.
She rasped, crawling closer,dread a stone in her throat.
But the seats were wrong.
Row 12, not 19.
(10:43):
Not her mother.
Relief clashed with grief andshe retched bile into the ferns,
her body shaking as shestumbled back to the ever widening
stream.
The current pulled herforward, a lifeline she clung to
through the haze.
The 10th day nearly broke her spirit.
Her legs trembled, her soreswept, and the beetles were a constant
(11:05):
torment.
She sank by the riverbank, thewater lapping at her legs, and stared
at the sky through a gap inthe canopy.
I can't, she whispered, hervoice a ghost.
Memories flooded in.
Her father's stern lessonsabout the jungle, her mother's gentle
hands guiding hers to sketch a hummingbird.
(11:26):
You're stronger than you know,maria had said once, smiling over
a campfire.
Julianne wiped her tears,smearing mud across her face, and
rose, swaying like a reed inthe wind.
Then a sound, a faintmechanical buzz, alien amid the jungle's
pulse.
(11:47):
Her heart wept, a fragileember flaring to life.
She staggered forward.
Branches tore at her face,thorns raked her legs, the jungle
fighting to keep her.
She broke into a clearingwhere the stream joined two others
and widened into a river andsaw it.
A canoe tied to a stake near aprimitive lean to on the bank.
(12:09):
Three loggers stared at her,axes mid swing, their weathered faces
slack with disbelief.
She was a specter, filthy,skeletal, her blond hair a wild tangle
of mud, blood, and leaves, herdress shredded to rags.
The plane fell.
She croaked in Spanish.
(12:30):
The men blinked, then surgedforward, catching her as her knees
buckled.
They spoke in rapid kekwa,then Spanish.
Their voices were a lifeline,pulling her back from the abyss.
They gave her manioc root, itsstarchy bite, a shock to her starved
tongue, and held a tin cup ofwater to her trembling lips.
(12:52):
One of the men grimaced at herarm, fetching kerosene to burn out
the beetles, the sting a sharpmercy she welcomed.
With a hiss.
They wrapped her in a coarseblanket, their disbelief hardening
into awe as she recounted herfall, her trek, and her survival
in mumbles between bites offood and sips of water.
(13:12):
The next day they rode herdownriver, the jungle unfurling to
reveal a settlement's edge.
Huts, voices, the hum of a radio.
On January 3, 1972, 10 daysafter the crash, Juliane Koepcke
was airlifted to Pucallpa, herbody frail, her eyes hollow but her
(13:33):
will unbroken.
In the hospital, her fatherarrived, his stern face crumpling
as he folded her into his arms.
The crash site spanned miles,he told her, a graveyard of wreckage
and loss.
Maria was gone, her seat foundempty, her spirit scattered with
the other lost souls of LanzaFlight 508.
(13:57):
Julianne, a girl who fell fromthe clouds and walked out of the
abyss.
Ten days in the belly of thejungle, armed with little more than
memory and will, she defiedthe odds that claimed 91 others.
The wreckage of the plain liesscattered still, a silent monument
to chance and chaos, whileJulianne returns to the world, a
(14:19):
botanist now mapping the verywilderness that nearly consumed her.
Was it luck that spared herthe lessons of a father's voice echoing
through the trees?
Or something deeper, a threadof destiny woven into the fabric
of the unknown?
In the end, her story leavesus with a when the sky betrays us
(14:40):
and the earth rises to meetus, what do we find in the space
between?
The answer, like Julianneherself, resides in the uncharted
corners of where reality frays.
Today's second story is thePoisoned Cake Affair.
(15:01):
Sydney, Australia.
Home to a woman whose apronhides a recipe not for comfort but
for vengeance.
A cake baked with care,seasoned with rat poison, and intended
for her boorish husband, Harold.
Tonight her plan is set, theoven warm and the stage primed for
murder.
(15:21):
But tonight, fate hasrewritten her script.
This is the Poisoned Cake Affair.
Marjorie Evans was a slightwoman with mousy brown hair and a
quiet demeanor that belied herinner turmoil.
Born to a strict Methodistfamily in rural New South Wales,
(15:42):
she had married Harold becauseof his rugged charm and steady job
as a mechanic.
They settled into a singlestory brick home on Eldridge Road
back Bankstown, a gritty,working class pocket of Sydney dotted
with Fibro cottages and corner pubs.
For a time, they were Content,Marjorie kept a tidy house, grew
(16:04):
roses in the backyard andbaked treats for neighbors.
Harold fixed cars and playeddarts at the Bankstown RSL Club.
But within only a few years,the marriage had soured.
Harold's drinking, once aweekend habit, became nightly, fueled
by long shifts and punctuatedby a temper that flared without warning.
(16:26):
Neighbors recalled frequentlyhearing him shouting at Marjorie.
She confided to her sisterEllen about bruises hidden under
long sleeves and Harold'sthreats to clear out and leave her
with nothing.
After a particularly brutalrow where Harold smashed her favorite
teapot, Marjorie decided she'dhad enough.
(16:47):
She later told police that shejust wanted peace and thought, well,
he likes cake.
Her weapon of choice was ahalf empty box of rat sac, a strychnine
based poison stashed in thegarage for a rodent problem they'd
had the previous summer.
Strychnine is a bitteralkaloid that kills by overstimulating
(17:07):
the nervous system.
Muscle cease, breathing stops,then an agonizing death comes within
hours.
Marjorie knew this from awarning label.
It perfectly suited her purposes.
On a July afternoon in 1985, aFriday, Marjorie was alone in her
cramped kitchen, baking.
(17:27):
The radio played Slim Dusties,a pub with no beer.
A fittingly ironic backdrop,she thought, sifting flour and cocoa
with trembling hands, sheemptied the rat sack into the batter
about 2 ounces, which was farmore than needed, masking its bitterness
with extra sugar.
The cake rose perfectly, itsglossy surface belying the death
(17:50):
within.
She set it on the counter,scribbled for Harold in joy on a
scrap of paper, and drove herrusty Holden Gemini to her sister's
house in Liverpool, 12 miles southwest.
I need a break, she toldEllen, who noticed her power but
asked no further questions.
Harold's routine made her plan plausible.
(18:13):
Most Fridays he'd stumble homefrom the pub around 10pm Ravenous
after having skipped dinner.
A slice of cake would beirresistible, Marjorie calculated.
He'd eat, collapse and be deadby morning, hopefully mistaken for
a heart attack, given hisheavy smoking.
She had returned Saturday,feigned shock, and then start anew.
(18:36):
It was a cold, meticulousscheme from a woman who'd never so
much as jaywalked.
Harold, however, threw awrench in her plot.
After work, he met mates atthe Bankstown Hotel, downing schooners
of Tuohys until midnight, whenhe passed out at a booth in the back
of the bar.
Enter Kevin Doyle, a wiry 29year old with a patchy beard and
(19:00):
a rap sheet of petty thefts,which were mostly pilfered TVs and
wallets.
Kevin had been sleeping roughin a nearby park, surviving on scraps
and odd jobs.
Spotting the darkened Evanshome around 12:30am he saw an easy
mark.
The back door's flimsy lockgave way to his pocket knife and
(19:21):
he crept inside, flashlight in hand.
The kitchen was his first stop.
He rifled drawers for cash,finding only loose change.
Then the rat poison laced cakecaught his eye.
Kevin hadn't eaten since astale pie the day before.
He grabbed a knife, cut athick wedge and woofed it down.
(19:42):
Standing over the sink, crumbsfalling onto Marjorie's note, he
felt lucky.
Twenty minutes later, as hesearched the living room, his stomach
cramped.
Then came spasms.
First his legs, then his arms.
Locking rigid, he staggered,knocking over a lamp, and fell near
(20:03):
the sofa, convulsing uncontrollably.
Foam flecked his lips as hisbody arched in a classic strychnine
pose.
Alone, he'd have died withinthe hour.
But fate intervened.
Harold rolled in at 1:05ambleary and cursing as he fumbled
his keys.
The first thing he saw was thehalf eaten cake in the kitchen.
(20:25):
Then a moan drew him to theliving room, where he found Kevin,
a stranger, writhing in painon his rug.
Adrenaline snapped him sober.
Oi.
What the hell, he grumbled,snatching up the phone and dialing
emergency services.
The operator dispatched anambulance, and paramedics arrived
10 minutes later, by whichtime Kevin was barely breathing and
(20:48):
his Pulse raced at 140 beatsper minute.
They loaded him into anambulance and for some reason Harold
trailed behind in his ute.
At Bankstown Hospital, theemergency staff recognized strychnine
poisoning from toxicologytraining, rare in urban settings,
but still unmistakable.
(21:09):
They pumped Kevin's stomach,dosed him with diazepam to halt the
seizures, and and hooked himto a ventilator as he slipped into
a coma.
Harold paced the waiting room,piecing together Marjorie's absence
in the cake's roll, dreadsettling in.
By 3am Kevin had stabilized,though he remained unconscious.
(21:30):
A routine ECG run to monitorhis heart under stress flagged an
aortic stenosis, a narrowingof the valve that pumps blood from
the heart.
Untreated, it could kill.
Suddenly, doctors estimatedKevin had months, perhaps only weeks,
before a fatal collapse.
(21:51):
The poisoning's adrenalinesurge had pushed his heart to a detectable
limit, a fluke that saved himfrom a quieter death.
It's like the poison rang abloody alarm bell, one cardiologist
later quipped to police.
When Kevin awoke the next day,groggy and tethered, to IVs.
He mumbled about breaking inbut couldn't remember the cake.
(22:14):
Detectives arrived, alerted bythe hospital's mandatory poisoning
report.
Harold, meanwhile, calledEllen's house, demanding Marjorie
return.
She arrived at 2pm Pale andsilent until a detective pressed
her for answers and threatenedto arrest her if she didn't explain
what had happened in her home.
(22:34):
I did it for him, shewhispered, nodding at Harold.
I didn't mean this.
Tears followed as sheconfessed everything.
The case could have ended in acourtroom drama.
Attempted murder carries ahefty sentence in Australia.
But Harold, a burly man with agruff exterior, softened.
(22:55):
He had cheated death bychance, and Kevin's survival stirred
something in him.
She's not a killer, he told detectives.
She's just she's lost it.
And this poor bastard's alivebecause of her.
He refused to testify, citingtheir years together and his own
role in pushing her to the edge.
(23:16):
Kevin, recovering in a wardbed, learned the full story from
a nurse.
Far from angry, he laughed araspy, pained sound.
Broke into the wrong house,ate the wrong cake and got a new
lease, he said.
He told police he'd take theburglary wrap but begged them to
go easy on the lady.
(23:36):
His heart surgery fixed, thestenosis funded by a hospital charity.
After his story spread amongthe staff, the Crown Prosecutor hesitated.
With no cooperative victim,Harold or Kevin and Marjorie's queer
remorse, the they downgradedthe charge to reckless endangerment.
A judge sentenced her to twoyears probation and mandatory counseling,
(23:59):
Noting the extraordinarycircumstances, Harold shook Kevin's
hand outside the courthouse,muttering, stay out of my house next
time.
The aftermath reshaped allthree lives.
Marjorie and Harold separatedby Christmas, their marriage irreparable
despite the leniency.
But he didn't contest thedivorce, leaving her the house.
(24:22):
She sold it in 1986, moving toBundaberg, Queensland, where she
worked in a library andavoided ovens.
Harold quit the pub circuit,took up fishing and kept a photo
of Kevin's thank you card.
Cheers for not letting mecroak, mate.
Signed KD 1986.
Kevin, discharged in August,swore off crime.
(24:46):
The surgery gave him a literalnew heart, and a social worker found
him a warehouse gig in Parramatta.
He lived quietly, dying ofpneumonia in 2009 at 53 years of
age, his obituary failing tomention the cake that saved him.
The stories presented areinspired by true events.
(25:07):
Names may have been changedfor privacy reasons.
New episodes are uploadedevery Monday and Thursday.
If you're enjoying the journeyinto the strange, the mysterious,
and the unexplained, Be sureto press that Follow or Subscribe
button and turn on allnotifications so you're alerted whenever
an episode drops.
Imagine a world teetering onthe edge of the familiar, a place
where the fabric of theeveryday begins to unravel, revealing
glimpses of the extraordinarylurking beneath.
You're about to embark on ajourney into the enigmatic, where
the peculiar and theperplexing intertwine, where every
(00:22):
tale twists the mind and tugsat the spirit.
It's a descent into thestrange, the mysterious, and the
unexplained.
This is when Reality Phrasewelcome to the Podcast.
New episodes are publishedevery Monday and Thursday, and when
Reality Phrase is availableeverywhere, fine podcasts are found.
(00:46):
Before we move on, please hitthat Follow or Subscribe button and
turn on all the reminders soyou're alerted when new episodes
are released.
Thank you for listening.
Now let's get to the stories.
Today's episode contains two stories.
First up is the Girl who Fellfrom the Clouds, a remarkable tale
(01:09):
of survival in the Amazon jungle.
And the second story of theday is the Poisoned Cake Affair,
the unbelievable story of awife who set out to murder her husband
but saved a stranger instead.
A girl named Julianne Koepke,17 years old, a passenger on a flight
(01:29):
bound for nowhere, a speck ofhumanity caught in the gears of fate.
It's December 24, 1971, whenshe boards a plane as fragile as
a promise, soaring over theendless green void of the Peruvian
Amazon.
What begins as a holidaypilgrimage to her father's jungle
outpost ends in a thunderclapand a descent into a world where
(01:54):
survival is not a gift but a riddle.
Now you're invited to join heron a journey through the shadows
of the wild, where the linebetween life and death blurs and
a human spirit is tested in atrial of nature's own design.
You're about to enter a placewhere reality frays.
(02:16):
This is the story of the girlwho Fell from the clouds.
The sky churned like a woundedbeast as Lanza Flight 508 fought
its way through the storm.
Julianne Koepke sat beside hermother, her forehead pressed to the
window's cool glass, watchinglightning fracture the horizon.
(02:36):
Her mother, Maria, clutched atattered notebook filled with an
ornithologist's sketches ofbirds she was studying.
They were flying from Lima toPucalpa, chasing a Christmas reunion
with Julianne's father, azoologist living at the Panguana
research station deep in the Amazon.
The cabin hummed with thevoices of 85 passengers, children
(02:58):
giggling over candy canes, apriest murmuring blessings, a young
couple whispering plans for aholiday tryst.
Julianne fidgeted in hersleeveless blue dress, a gift from
her mother.
Its hem brushed her knees andshe clutched a small bag of boiled
candies, their sweetness atether to the festive promise of
(03:19):
the holiday.
The plane shuddered, a rippleof unease threading through the chatter.
Turbulence, maria said, herGerman accent clipped, her hazel
eyes flicking to the wing.
Juliane nodded, swallowing theknot in her throat.
But the storm's growl grewlouder, more, more insistent.
(03:40):
Then it struck, a flash sobright it burned her retinas, a thunderclap
that shook her bones.
When lightning hit the rightwing, the plane's skin was breached
by the blast and a fuel lineruptured, high pressure aviation
glass igniting into a fiery plume.
The cabin erupted in chaos.
Lights flickered and died.
(04:01):
Luggage tumbled like stones inan avalanche from the overhead, and
screams rent the air.
The floor beneath her buckled,the plane's spine snapping midair.
A force beyond reckoningyanked Julianne's seat from its mounting,
her hand torn from her mother's.
The belt held her impossiblytight, as still strapped in, she
(04:24):
was flung through a gapinghole torn in the fuselage and into
the void.
The wind screamed, a bansheetearing at her ears as she spun through
darkness 10,000ft above the earth.
Julianne tried to scream asshe plummeted toward the rainforest
below, a jagged sea of green,but there was no breath in her lungs.
(04:46):
She crashed through thecanopy, branches snapping like gunfire,
thick leaves slashing herskin, her seat cushioning the fall
just enough to spare her life.
The impact slammed her intothe muddy earth and the world went
black, the jungle's breath thelast thing she felt.
Julianne awoke to rain, a softstaccato on her face, pulling her
(05:10):
from the abyss.
Pain roared through her.
Her collarbone was a jaggedache broken into plunge.
A gash above her right eyewept blood into her hair.
Her right arm hung limp,swollen and bruised.
She pushed herself up, gaspingas her bare foot sank into the sodden
ground, One sandal lost, hertoes curled against the cold mud.
(05:36):
Her glasses were gone, leavingthe jungle a blurred mosaic of greens
and shadows.
The air was thick withhumidity, alive with the whine of
insects and the distant criesof parrots.
She called out for her mother,but her voice cracked, a fragile
plea lost in the vastness.
The jungle pressed back, heavyand unyielding.
(05:59):
Around her was splinteredwreckage strewn beyond sight.
Bodies sat strapped into seatsthat hung high in the trees like
a macabre Christmas display.
Other pieces of the planelittered the jungle floor.
With a gasp of horror,Julianne turned away from a leg that
had been severed just belowthe hip.
She stumbled away from it,every step agony.
(06:23):
Her dress clung to her, tornand soaked, its blue faded to a muddy
smear.
A practical girl she recognized.
She was alone, but she wasalso a girl shaped by the wild, raised
in Panguana's embrace,tracking frogs with her father, sketching
birds with her mother.
Their voices echoed now, alifeline in the chaos.
(06:46):
Water is your map.
Find a stream, follow it downstream.
It leads to life.
She turned, her bare footbleeding against a root, and took
her first step, resolvehardening in her chest.
The first day was a baptism in pain.
Her broken collarbone joltedwith every movement, a white hot
(07:08):
spike.
She bit her lip to endure.
The gash on her foreheadthrobbed, sweat and blood mingling
in a bitter sting.
The jungle loomed, its canopya vaulted ceiling filtering sunlight
into a dim emerald glow.
Vines coiled like traps,snagging her legs while bromelaides
dripped water she licked fromtheir cups.
(07:31):
She found a trickle of a stream.
By midday, its surface cloudedwith silt.
Kneeling, she drank, thecoolness cutting through her parched
throat.
She waded in the water ankledeep, her one sandal slapping against
the stones as the currentbecame her guide.
Night fell hard, thetemperature plummeting as the jungle
(07:53):
sang its nocturnal hymn.
How her monkeys roared, theircries a primal wail that shivered
down her spine.
She curled beneath a buttressroot, its gnarled arms a frail shield.
The ground was spongy, seepingthrough her dress, and mosquitoes
swarmed there, bites a redconstellation on her arms.
(08:14):
Sleep came in shards,fractured by visions.
The plane's fire, her mother'shands slipping away, the endless
fall.
She woke to small beetlesburrowing into the cuts on her arm,
their bodies wriggling in her flesh.
Revulsion churned her gut, butshe had no knife, no strength to
(08:34):
dig them out.
You're alive, she whispered,her breath a faint cloud in the dawn's
chill.
Keep moving.
Days bled into a relentless march.
Her stomach was a hollow drum,echoing with hunger.
She rationed her steps,resting when dizziness spun her vision,
the world a watery smearwithout her glasses.
(08:56):
The stream widened, its bankslick with clay, and she followed
it, her bare foot raw fromthorns, her sandal caked in mud.
The jungle was a crucible,testing her with every breath.
A caiman watched her from theshallows, its eyes glinting like
coins, jaws parting in asilent threat.
(09:18):
She froze, heart hammering,until it sank beneath the surface,
leaving ripples she dared not cross.
Too soon later, a jaguar'sgrowl rumbled through the trees and
a Shadow paced her from justbeyond sight.
She pressed on, fear a bittertaste she swallowed down.
(09:38):
By day five, her body was a ruin.
The beetles burrowed deeper,their itch a maddening pulse.
Her skin blistered from thesun, peeled by vines, and her cuts
festered in the humid air.
She stumbled on more wreckage.
A suitcase burst open,spilling a child's doll and a sodden
bottle Bible into the mud.
(09:59):
Her chest tightened.
Was it her mother's?
She knelt, hands trembling,but the bag was not Maria's satchel.
She turned away, tears burningher eyes, and kept walking, the river
her only compass.
Day eight brought a grimmerfind, a section of the plains.
Tail vines were alreadyclaiming it for their own, weaving
(10:21):
through its metal ribs.
Within, soon to be lostforever, were three bodies still
strapped to seats.
Their faces were cloaked indecay, flies buzzing.
A dirge.
Momma.
She rasped, crawling closer,dread a stone in her throat.
But the seats were wrong.
Row 12, not 19.
(10:43):
Not her mother.
Relief clashed with grief andshe retched bile into the ferns,
her body shaking as shestumbled back to the ever widening
stream.
The current pulled herforward, a lifeline she clung to
through the haze.
The 10th day nearly broke her spirit.
Her legs trembled, her soreswept, and the beetles were a constant
(11:05):
torment.
She sank by the riverbank, thewater lapping at her legs, and stared
at the sky through a gap inthe canopy.
I can't, she whispered, hervoice a ghost.
Memories flooded in.
Her father's stern lessonsabout the jungle, her mother's gentle
hands guiding hers to sketch a hummingbird.
(11:26):
You're stronger than you know,maria had said once, smiling over
a campfire.
Julianne wiped her tears,smearing mud across her face, and
rose, swaying like a reed inthe wind.
Then a sound, a faintmechanical buzz, alien amid the jungle's
pulse.
(11:47):
Her heart wept, a fragileember flaring to life.
She staggered forward.
Branches tore at her face,thorns raked her legs, the jungle
fighting to keep her.
She broke into a clearingwhere the stream joined two others
and widened into a river andsaw it.
A canoe tied to a stake near aprimitive lean to on the bank.
(12:09):
Three loggers stared at her,axes mid swing, their weathered faces
slack with disbelief.
She was a specter, filthy,skeletal, her blond hair a wild tangle
of mud, blood, and leaves, herdress shredded to rags.
The plane fell.
She croaked in Spanish.
(12:30):
The men blinked, then surgedforward, catching her as her knees
buckled.
They spoke in rapid kekwa,then Spanish.
Their voices were a lifeline,pulling her back from the abyss.
They gave her manioc root, itsstarchy bite, a shock to her starved
tongue, and held a tin cup ofwater to her trembling lips.
(12:52):
One of the men grimaced at herarm, fetching kerosene to burn out
the beetles, the sting a sharpmercy she welcomed.
With a hiss.
They wrapped her in a coarseblanket, their disbelief hardening
into awe as she recounted herfall, her trek, and her survival
in mumbles between bites offood and sips of water.
(13:12):
The next day they rode herdownriver, the jungle unfurling to
reveal a settlement's edge.
Huts, voices, the hum of a radio.
On January 3, 1972, 10 daysafter the crash, Juliane Koepcke
was airlifted to Pucallpa, herbody frail, her eyes hollow but her
(13:33):
will unbroken.
In the hospital, her fatherarrived, his stern face crumpling
as he folded her into his arms.
The crash site spanned miles,he told her, a graveyard of wreckage
and loss.
Maria was gone, her seat foundempty, her spirit scattered with
the other lost souls of LanzaFlight 508.
(13:57):
Julianne, a girl who fell fromthe clouds and walked out of the
abyss.
Ten days in the belly of thejungle, armed with little more than
memory and will, she defiedthe odds that claimed 91 others.
The wreckage of the plain liesscattered still, a silent monument
to chance and chaos, whileJulianne returns to the world, a
(14:19):
botanist now mapping the verywilderness that nearly consumed her.
Was it luck that spared herthe lessons of a father's voice echoing
through the trees?
Or something deeper, a threadof destiny woven into the fabric
of the unknown?
In the end, her story leavesus with a when the sky betrays us
(14:40):
and the earth rises to meetus, what do we find in the space
between?
The answer, like Julianneherself, resides in the uncharted
corners of where reality frays.
Today's second story is thePoisoned Cake Affair.
(15:01):
Sydney, Australia.
Home to a woman whose apronhides a recipe not for comfort but
for vengeance.
A cake baked with care,seasoned with rat poison, and intended
for her boorish husband, Harold.
Tonight her plan is set, theoven warm and the stage primed for
murder.
(15:21):
But tonight, fate hasrewritten her script.
This is the Poisoned Cake Affair.
Marjorie Evans was a slightwoman with mousy brown hair and a
quiet demeanor that belied herinner turmoil.
Born to a strict Methodistfamily in rural New South Wales,
(15:42):
she had married Harold becauseof his rugged charm and steady job
as a mechanic.
They settled into a singlestory brick home on Eldridge Road
back Bankstown, a gritty,working class pocket of Sydney dotted
with Fibro cottages and corner pubs.
For a time, they were Content,Marjorie kept a tidy house, grew
(16:04):
roses in the backyard andbaked treats for neighbors.
Harold fixed cars and playeddarts at the Bankstown RSL Club.
But within only a few years,the marriage had soured.
Harold's drinking, once aweekend habit, became nightly, fueled
by long shifts and punctuatedby a temper that flared without warning.
(16:26):
Neighbors recalled frequentlyhearing him shouting at Marjorie.
She confided to her sisterEllen about bruises hidden under
long sleeves and Harold'sthreats to clear out and leave her
with nothing.
After a particularly brutalrow where Harold smashed her favorite
teapot, Marjorie decided she'dhad enough.
(16:47):
She later told police that shejust wanted peace and thought, well,
he likes cake.
Her weapon of choice was ahalf empty box of rat sac, a strychnine
based poison stashed in thegarage for a rodent problem they'd
had the previous summer.
Strychnine is a bitteralkaloid that kills by overstimulating
(17:07):
the nervous system.
Muscle cease, breathing stops,then an agonizing death comes within
hours.
Marjorie knew this from awarning label.
It perfectly suited her purposes.
On a July afternoon in 1985, aFriday, Marjorie was alone in her
cramped kitchen, baking.
(17:27):
The radio played Slim Dusties,a pub with no beer.
A fittingly ironic backdrop,she thought, sifting flour and cocoa
with trembling hands, sheemptied the rat sack into the batter
about 2 ounces, which was farmore than needed, masking its bitterness
with extra sugar.
The cake rose perfectly, itsglossy surface belying the death
(17:50):
within.
She set it on the counter,scribbled for Harold in joy on a
scrap of paper, and drove herrusty Holden Gemini to her sister's
house in Liverpool, 12 miles southwest.
I need a break, she toldEllen, who noticed her power but
asked no further questions.
Harold's routine made her plan plausible.
(18:13):
Most Fridays he'd stumble homefrom the pub around 10pm Ravenous
after having skipped dinner.
A slice of cake would beirresistible, Marjorie calculated.
He'd eat, collapse and be deadby morning, hopefully mistaken for
a heart attack, given hisheavy smoking.
She had returned Saturday,feigned shock, and then start anew.
(18:36):
It was a cold, meticulousscheme from a woman who'd never so
much as jaywalked.
Harold, however, threw awrench in her plot.
After work, he met mates atthe Bankstown Hotel, downing schooners
of Tuohys until midnight, whenhe passed out at a booth in the back
of the bar.
Enter Kevin Doyle, a wiry 29year old with a patchy beard and
(19:00):
a rap sheet of petty thefts,which were mostly pilfered TVs and
wallets.
Kevin had been sleeping roughin a nearby park, surviving on scraps
and odd jobs.
Spotting the darkened Evanshome around 12:30am he saw an easy
mark.
The back door's flimsy lockgave way to his pocket knife and
(19:21):
he crept inside, flashlight in hand.
The kitchen was his first stop.
He rifled drawers for cash,finding only loose change.
Then the rat poison laced cakecaught his eye.
Kevin hadn't eaten since astale pie the day before.
He grabbed a knife, cut athick wedge and woofed it down.
(19:42):
Standing over the sink, crumbsfalling onto Marjorie's note, he
felt lucky.
Twenty minutes later, as hesearched the living room, his stomach
cramped.
Then came spasms.
First his legs, then his arms.
Locking rigid, he staggered,knocking over a lamp, and fell near
(20:03):
the sofa, convulsing uncontrollably.
Foam flecked his lips as hisbody arched in a classic strychnine
pose.
Alone, he'd have died withinthe hour.
But fate intervened.
Harold rolled in at 1:05ambleary and cursing as he fumbled
his keys.
The first thing he saw was thehalf eaten cake in the kitchen.
(20:25):
Then a moan drew him to theliving room, where he found Kevin,
a stranger, writhing in painon his rug.
Adrenaline snapped him sober.
Oi.
What the hell, he grumbled,snatching up the phone and dialing
emergency services.
The operator dispatched anambulance, and paramedics arrived
10 minutes later, by whichtime Kevin was barely breathing and
(20:48):
his Pulse raced at 140 beatsper minute.
They loaded him into anambulance and for some reason Harold
trailed behind in his ute.
At Bankstown Hospital, theemergency staff recognized strychnine
poisoning from toxicologytraining, rare in urban settings,
but still unmistakable.
(21:09):
They pumped Kevin's stomach,dosed him with diazepam to halt the
seizures, and and hooked himto a ventilator as he slipped into
a coma.
Harold paced the waiting room,piecing together Marjorie's absence
in the cake's roll, dreadsettling in.
By 3am Kevin had stabilized,though he remained unconscious.
(21:30):
A routine ECG run to monitorhis heart under stress flagged an
aortic stenosis, a narrowingof the valve that pumps blood from
the heart.
Untreated, it could kill.
Suddenly, doctors estimatedKevin had months, perhaps only weeks,
before a fatal collapse.
(21:51):
The poisoning's adrenalinesurge had pushed his heart to a detectable
limit, a fluke that saved himfrom a quieter death.
It's like the poison rang abloody alarm bell, one cardiologist
later quipped to police.
When Kevin awoke the next day,groggy and tethered, to IVs.
He mumbled about breaking inbut couldn't remember the cake.
(22:14):
Detectives arrived, alerted bythe hospital's mandatory poisoning
report.
Harold, meanwhile, calledEllen's house, demanding Marjorie
return.
She arrived at 2pm Pale andsilent until a detective pressed
her for answers and threatenedto arrest her if she didn't explain
what had happened in her home.
(22:34):
I did it for him, shewhispered, nodding at Harold.
I didn't mean this.
Tears followed as sheconfessed everything.
The case could have ended in acourtroom drama.
Attempted murder carries ahefty sentence in Australia.
But Harold, a burly man with agruff exterior, softened.
(22:55):
He had cheated death bychance, and Kevin's survival stirred
something in him.
She's not a killer, he told detectives.
She's just she's lost it.
And this poor bastard's alivebecause of her.
He refused to testify, citingtheir years together and his own
role in pushing her to the edge.
(23:16):
Kevin, recovering in a wardbed, learned the full story from
a nurse.
Far from angry, he laughed araspy, pained sound.
Broke into the wrong house,ate the wrong cake and got a new
lease, he said.
He told police he'd take theburglary wrap but begged them to
go easy on the lady.
(23:36):
His heart surgery fixed, thestenosis funded by a hospital charity.
After his story spread amongthe staff, the Crown Prosecutor hesitated.
With no cooperative victim,Harold or Kevin and Marjorie's queer
remorse, the they downgradedthe charge to reckless endangerment.
A judge sentenced her to twoyears probation and mandatory counseling,
(23:59):
Noting the extraordinarycircumstances, Harold shook Kevin's
hand outside the courthouse,muttering, stay out of my house next
time.
The aftermath reshaped allthree lives.
Marjorie and Harold separatedby Christmas, their marriage irreparable
despite the leniency.
But he didn't contest thedivorce, leaving her the house.
(24:22):
She sold it in 1986, moving toBundaberg, Queensland, where she
worked in a library andavoided ovens.
Harold quit the pub circuit,took up fishing and kept a photo
of Kevin's thank you card.
Cheers for not letting mecroak, mate.
Signed KD 1986.
Kevin, discharged in August,swore off crime.
(24:46):
The surgery gave him a literalnew heart, and a social worker found
him a warehouse gig in Parramatta.
He lived quietly, dying ofpneumonia in 2009 at 53 years of
age, his obituary failing tomention the cake that saved him.
The stories presented areinspired by true events.
(25:07):
Names may have been changedfor privacy reasons.
New episodes are uploadedevery Monday and Thursday.
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