0:02

A listener production.

0:04

Hi Gisteners, Rosie here. And

0:07

you know, we've been doing just the gist

0:09

for quite a while now, which means we

0:12

have ended up with a pretty big

0:14

back catalogue of amazing

0:16

greatest hits kind

0:18

of stories. Oh my gosh, I love saying back catalogue.

0:20

It makes me feel like Mariah Carey.

0:24

And so we figured it might be time to

0:26

start republishing

0:28

a couple of our favourite

0:31

greatest hits, because there's

0:33

so many new gisteners since when we started.

0:36

And also it's been so long since some of these that

0:38

a lot of you haven't heard some of the really cool stories

0:40

we've done. And a lot of you forgot

0:43

that, you know, the ones from a couple of years

0:45

ago even happened. Someone tagged me and

0:47

said, I loved that story you did about XYZ

0:49

the other day. And I was like, Oh my God, I forgot. I even told

0:51

that story. So we

0:54

thought it might be time to revisit some of our favourite

0:56

hits. And starting

0:58

today with one of my

1:01

all time favourite Just the Gist that I did, a lot

1:03

of people tell me that this is still their

1:05

favourite one that I've ever done.

1:08

This is the horrifying story

1:10

of the 1981 Trash Man yacht sinking. Now

1:16

this is unhinged.

1:19

It's deranged. It's been called one of the worst

1:21

shark attack stories of all time. This

1:24

yacht sinks. There's five crew members.

1:27

Sharks start circling them. The crew members are

1:29

getting chopped off one by one. There's

1:32

starvation. There's thirst. People are

1:34

going crazy. Zombifying. It's

1:36

nuts. It is just

1:37

epic thing after epic thing after epic

1:39

thing. You'll be on the edge of your seat. This

1:42

is one of my favourite, greatest

1:44

hits from the back catalogue. I'm like

1:46

a pop star. This is

1:48

the horrifying story of the 1981 Trash

1:50

Man Yacht sinking.

2:00

I don't know how to describe this one.

2:03

Normally I would give you a bit of

2:05

a taste of where the story is going at the

2:07

top, but this one is

2:09

just so crazy. I

2:11

think to reveal anything up front,

2:14

it just feels like the wrong way to do it. I think you just

2:16

need to experience this crazy story as

2:19

it unfolds, but I will say

2:21

that a boat sinks, people die,

2:23

there's

2:24

shark attacks, there's being stranded

2:26

in the ocean, there's people getting delirious

2:29

and acting like zombies, like buckle

2:31

in, this is a wild

2:33

ride. Are you ready for this?

2:35

I'm actually really keen for this. I

2:38

just thought let's do a fun, crazy, weird

2:41

survival story. Okay,

2:44

so it's

2:45

October 1982. Oh,

2:48

I thought this was gonna be like pirate era,

2:51

the 1600s or 1700s or something.

2:54

Oh, this is closer to like the Ruby princess

2:57

type boat.

2:57

Yeah, this is like shoulder pads,

3:00

wham, Princess Diana

3:02

just got married, I think. It's all

3:04

around then, it's all happening. Eighties.

3:08

Okay, so here for this, yes. So

3:10

a billionaire who made

3:13

his money in the rubbish business but

3:15

has just bought an 18 metre luxury

3:18

yacht and named it the Trash Man.

3:20

Mm-hmm. As

3:23

billionaires do, I remember I was

3:25

reading that it was called the Trash Man and I was so confused,

3:27

I was like, I bet whoever bought that like

3:30

owns a rubbish collecting company and he does. As

3:34

billionaires, you know, tend to do, he

3:36

bought it, I think without really knowing what the

3:38

hell to do with it, he didn't know how to sail it. So

3:40

he hires a crew to sail the

3:42

yacht from where he bought it in Maine to

3:44

where he lives down in Florida, which

3:47

is kind of like going sailing

3:49

from, I would say,

3:51

Brisbane to like Tasmania

3:54

or like all that way.

3:56

It's quite a long way, takes about six days. So

3:58

there's a captain.

3:59

a guy called John and

4:02

there's crew members, Mark, Brad,

4:04

and Deborah, plus Captain John brings

4:06

along this new girl he's dating called Meg.

4:09

And they're all in their like mid to late 20s. They're all

4:11

pretty experienced sailors. Deborah

4:13

especially had just the year before been

4:16

the first woman to win the wit

4:18

bread round the world yacht race,

4:20

which sounds like something only very rich

4:23

people called, you know, tipsy

4:25

and and Gordon

4:28

rambunctial pit do

4:31

the only one who doesn't know anything about

4:34

sailing or has any experiences Meg

4:36

the captain's girlfriend, she's like pretty much never sailed

4:38

before. She's just there for the ride for the fun because

4:41

it is a really fun thing to do. And this

4:43

kind of thing is often how experienced sailors

4:46

would make money when they weren't racing

4:48

like people hire them to just can you take

4:50

my yacht from point A to point B like that's

4:53

the can you crew my yacht for this whatever.

4:56

And so this particular trip, like I said, it was going

4:58

to take about six days and you sail and

5:00

it's beautiful and you swim and you chill like

5:03

you're pretty much being paid to just be on a luxury

5:05

yacht for six days. Good

5:08

gig. But Deborah

5:10

immediately notices that things aren't ideal.

5:13

The yacht just doesn't really seem to be kitted

5:16

out properly just all seems a bit dodgy.

5:18

Also, Captain John seems lazy.

5:21

He just kind of wants to hang out with his girlfriend Meg

5:24

and mark one of the other dudes. He

5:26

just wants to get pissed and party like he's just drinking

5:28

all the time. So she kind of feels like she

5:31

and Brad are the only ones who are like Yes,

5:33

we can have fun. But also sailing is serious

5:35

and dangerous and we, you know, need to just keep

5:37

our wits about us. But then she's

5:40

like, you know what, it's six days and it's good money. I

5:42

don't have to sell with them ever again after this. So

5:45

just get through it. And I will say

5:47

at this point, that Deborah survives

5:49

all of this. I won't tell you if anyone else

5:51

does. But this whole story is

5:53

pretty much told from her point of view because she went

5:56

on to write a book about it. And there was a couple of like

5:58

Lifetime TV movies about it.

5:59

one starring Melissa Joan

6:02

Hart.

6:04

I was thinking about her just

6:06

yesterday and I used to love

6:08

it so much when she would get called out on other

6:10

shows for how terrible she

6:12

was as an actor.

6:13

Aww, bless her

6:15

heart. She did her best.

6:18

It was just remarkable that she just continued

6:20

to get work time and time again. I

6:22

know, she really did. I'm not surprised that she ended up

6:24

doing Lifetime movies. And

6:26

do you remember in, I

6:28

think it was the 2000s, where she

6:30

and Joey Lawrence did a sitcom called Melissa

6:33

and Joey and it was basically just like two

6:35

washed up sitcom stars. Like maybe

6:37

if we do it together, people

6:39

will watch. They didn't. I'm

6:44

not going to hump that down because I agree we want to

6:46

say that.

6:47

Love.

6:50

So I watched Deborah tell

6:52

this story on this amazing cheesy show called

6:55

I Shouldn't Be Alive. And

6:58

you know, I love shows like this. I watch them all the time. I

7:01

watched it in Australia on Amazon Prime. So

7:04

the first night they're out in the ocean, storm hits, which

7:06

was unexpected because it wasn't on any one

7:09

of their printed out weather

7:11

predict things that they had because this was 1982. So nothing

7:13

was computerized. Like before

7:15

you leave, you print out your weather predictions, you

7:17

print out your stuff and

7:19

you take paper versions with you. The

7:22

waves are like 40 to 50 feet high, which

7:24

I looked up. It's about 10 to 15 meters. Deborah

7:28

said it feels like, you know, it's like a roller coaster. You

7:30

go up and up and up and up and then you drop and you

7:32

know that feeling when you drop, it's like your

7:34

stomach doesn't drop as quickly as you and

7:37

you'd get that. Yeah. Like, um,

7:40

and storms, she said, are often quite

7:42

fun for experienced sailors because it's like, you know, a bit different.

7:44

You challenge yourself. It's like breaks

7:46

up them and not knee. But

7:49

Mark is super drunk

7:52

and she's like, he's up on deck howling

7:54

like a cowboy, having the best

7:56

time. Captain

7:57

John's also a bit drunk and he's brought his

7:59

girlfriend.

7:59

Meg up on deck and then she fell

8:02

over because she wasn't used to being on, you

8:04

know, in conditions like that. She hurts herself

8:06

really badly. She's screaming in

8:09

pain, but they can't really figure out where she's

8:11

hurt herself or what's happened. And

8:13

Captain John is like, okay, we should probably

8:15

try and go in to shore tonight

8:17

at least because Meg's hurt. But

8:20

then he goes and checks and he hasn't actually brought

8:22

any maps for this particular

8:23

part of the coastline. And Deborah's

8:26

like, Oh my God, you are so unprepared. She's

8:28

like, this is just, I'm really regretting

8:30

doing this. And then the

8:32

yacht's sails

8:34

rip off in the hurricane level

8:37

wind. And so yachts have

8:39

an engine, but it's really only

8:41

powerful enough to sort of drive you

8:43

from a dock to somewhere. You're

8:46

not meant to use a yacht's engine

8:48

out on the ocean. And so Captain

8:50

John is like trying to get the engine to start,

8:52

but it overheats. It doesn't work properly. It's a crappy

8:55

engine, which is another thing he should have checked

8:57

before they left, but he didn't because he's a crappy captain.

9:00

So now they have no sails. They have no engine.

9:02

They need the engine to send out

9:05

like that runs the battery of the radio. So

9:07

they need that to send out distress calls

9:09

or whatever. And they're just floating

9:11

in the ocean in the middle of this storm. And

9:14

Mark, the drunk one is the one steering

9:17

the yacht. And Deborah said he's holding a bottle

9:19

of scotch and laughing like a maniac

9:21

and just having the best time. And

9:23

Meg is still howling in pain. And

9:26

so Captain John is like, okay, we need to call

9:28

for rescue. We better do it now

9:31

because who knows how long the battery

9:33

will last now that the engine has gone. But

9:36

none of them really want to do it because they're all like, like

9:38

apparently it's like a thing of pride among boat

9:40

people. Like you get yourself out of your

9:43

own mess. Like don't call for rescue.

9:45

Just call. But he's like, no, no, we've

9:47

got to. We've got to. So he calls for rescue.

9:49

And then not long after that, this

9:52

freak wave comes and

9:54

they don't quite normally the waves come

9:56

you ride them and then you go over the other side.

9:59

But this wave. is so huge that they

10:01

ride it, ride it. They don't make it over

10:03

and it smashes into the

10:05

yacht, smashes all the glass in

10:07

the front of the yacht and water just

10:09

starts pouring inside immediately.

10:12

They start taking on water fast and Deborah's

10:14

like, okay, this boat

10:17

is going to sink in two minutes. Like, we need

10:19

to get off this yacht. And

10:21

so they have a life raft

10:23

that's in one of those pressurized plastic boxes.

10:26

Like, you know, it kind of looks like an esky and

10:28

when you push whatever button, it goes,

10:31

blows

10:33

up. Yeah. Like an airbag. Yeah. And inside

10:36

that there's like food and a beacon

10:38

and little machine that turns

10:41

saltwater into regular water. So

10:43

if you, it basically is

10:45

built for you to be on the ocean for

10:47

a while. And the only other thing

10:49

they have is this little inflatable dinghy. One

10:52

of those ones that kind of has the two like,

10:54

um, collar, like

10:56

air-filled tire columns and

10:58

then a little bit in between. And that

11:00

little dinghy is essentially just the thing that

11:02

you use to go from a dock out

11:05

to the yacht. So you know how a yacht is usually

11:07

anchored like 20 meters off

11:09

the shore and then you get in your little dinghy, you

11:11

go

11:12

out to the yacht and then that's it. That's

11:14

called a tender. Oh, is

11:16

it? Look at you. Well, I'm going

11:18

to keep calling it a dinghy because that's what I've written

11:20

here. So they all jump into the water. The crappy dinghys there.

11:30

And Mark is the one who's holding onto

11:32

the life raft, like Esky box. He jumps

11:34

into the water. He manages

11:36

to like pop it open.

11:38

So like an airbag, it

11:41

opens up, but then because

11:43

he's a bit drunk and the waves are like big

11:45

and it's stormy, he, a wave

11:47

comes and he just lets it go and it floats

11:49

away.

11:50

Oh, no.

11:52

And it's pitch black and it's gone. And

11:55

so captain John, Brad

11:58

and Deborah are in the crappy.

11:59

little dinghy. And when I say in, I mean

12:02

on, because it's upside down. So they're just clinging

12:04

to the sides and Mark

12:06

swims over to them, having just lost

12:09

their life raft. And then they're like, Oh shit,

12:11

where's Meg? And they're all experienced,

12:13

see people. So as soon as the yacht started sinking,

12:16

they just went into autopilot, knew what they had to do,

12:18

jump off, try and get the life raft, get the dinghy. And

12:21

then they look back over and they see Meg

12:23

is holding on to the very last bit

12:25

of the yacht that's going down kind of like

12:27

Jack and Rose at the end of Titanic. Like

12:29

she's

12:29

standing there like guys, guys,

12:33

and she's screaming and she's too scared

12:35

to let go. And she's in so much pain from

12:37

having hurt herself earlier. And

12:39

Deborah says the men just all

12:41

freeze. They don't know what to do. And

12:44

she's like, of course, because boss

12:46

bitch woman, she's like fine. And so she

12:48

swims over like, cause she's experienced

12:51

in the waves and in the water. So she knows grabs

12:54

her, pulls her back over to the

12:56

dinghy just as the

12:58

yacht completely disappears beneath the

13:00

water.

13:02

And so it's

13:03

pitch black. The water is freezing.

13:06

The wind chill is even colder.

13:08

There's crazy rain and wind and

13:10

waves. They're worried they'll dive hypothermia.

13:13

So they all get under the dinghy because

13:15

there's like an air pocket in there and

13:17

they kind of just lay next to each other,

13:20

like logs, like

13:22

to sort of share body heat. And that's

13:24

how they survived the night. And

13:27

when they have light in the morning, the wind

13:29

is still raging. It's stormy, but they decide

13:32

to flip the dinghy over to at

13:34

least get out of the cold water and

13:36

they throw Meg in the dinghy first and

13:38

they all clamber in. And that's when they see for the first

13:40

time, just what her injuries are

13:43

because her pants have all kind of come off. And

13:45

they see that when she fell, wire

13:48

from the rigging of the yacht had run

13:51

along her legs

13:52

and flushed them down

13:54

to the bone in several places. Yeah.

14:01

Which reminded me of like, you know,

14:03

that's, have you seen hereditary? That scene

14:05

in the end of hereditary with Tony Collette?

14:07

No, I haven't. For people who've seen it, you know exactly

14:09

what I'm talking about. Now I'm not gonna watch

14:12

it. Anyway,

14:14

so she's got wounds all

14:17

over her. And Deborah said she was heartbroken

14:19

when she looked at her because she was like, those wounds are

14:21

a death sentence, unless we get rescued in the next

14:23

hour, like she's effed. But

14:26

she doesn't say anything to her. She's already

14:28

panicking so much so she just leaves it. So

14:31

Deborah and Mark

14:33

jump into the water and they're

14:35

trying to keep the dinghy steady because there's

14:37

still a lot of waves and it's this crappy little inflatable

14:40

thing. So they're like in the water holding

14:42

onto the sides of the dinghy trying to keep it from

14:45

tipping over. And

14:47

then Mark turns to Deborah and he

14:49

says, stop kicking my leg. And

14:52

she's like, what? And he goes, stop kicking

14:54

my leg. And she's like, I'm not kicking

14:56

your leg. And then she moves away

14:58

from him to prove she's not kicking his leg. And

15:00

then he goes, I said, stop it. But

15:02

then they both look at each other

15:03

and they're like, oh, you're too far away. And

15:06

then she dips her head underwater. And she

15:08

said, I swear to God, it was

15:10

hundreds

15:12

of sharks,

15:12

like more sharks

15:15

than I have ever seen in my life,

15:17

like the swarm surrounding

15:20

us. She said she'd never seen that many

15:22

in one place before. So they scream

15:24

like sharks. And her and Mark scrambled

15:27

to get into the boat. And she said, they

15:29

were circling them like fins.

15:31

Like the fins were up just circling

15:33

them, like hunting them.

15:35

And so they're so scared the

15:37

dinghy is gonna tip at this point because

15:39

they can't stay in the water to hold it because

15:42

of the sharks. So they find this sort of bit

15:44

of metal in the bottom of the dinghy and

15:46

this kind of like metal plate that

15:49

I don't know, was part of something. And they're

15:51

like, well, let's tie this

15:53

to a piece of rope attached to the dinghy

15:55

and put it in the water so it can sort of act like

15:58

an anchor that will keep us at least.

15:59

steady on the water. So they tie

16:02

this metal sheet thing. It's kind of the sides

16:04

of a dinner tray. They tie

16:06

it to the rope, they throw it in the water. The second

16:08

it lands in the water, Deborah said

16:11

it was the biggest great white shark she'd ever

16:13

seen, swam

16:13

over, wrapped it in its mouth and just

16:15

started pulling them like a tugboat.

16:18

And so they're getting dragged along

16:21

behind this shark. And

16:23

then he starts swimming really erratically. They're

16:25

like, Oh my God, he's trying to tip this

16:27

boat over. And so they have

16:30

to cut the rope. So they cut the rope

16:32

that goes, I know,

16:36

it's, I told you, it's a wild ride.

16:38

It is a wild ride.

16:42

So because they don't have that anchor, they can't

16:44

get out of the water. The dinghy

16:47

is just

16:47

rocking precariously. Like every

16:50

wave could be the one that just tips them over.

16:52

And so they float in the middle of the ocean

16:54

all day. And then they're into night two

16:57

and night two was torturous for a few reasons.

16:59

I mean, they're freezing, obviously. They

17:02

haven't eaten or drank

17:03

water for

17:05

more than 24 hours now. And

17:07

they keep seeing the lights of ships and

17:10

a couple of them want to like try

17:12

and paddle towards the ships. But Deborah's like,

17:14

it's pitch black in the middle of the Atlantic

17:17

ocean. We can see them, but they

17:19

cannot see us. Like we're

17:21

not going to get to the paddling towards

17:24

ships. We'll just waste energy that we

17:26

don't have. Like, because we're not eating, we're not drinking.

17:29

And then it would rain

17:31

and they were so desperate to drink. So they'd all

17:33

like,

17:34

like tip their heads toward the sky and open

17:36

their mouths, like trying to catch rainwater to

17:38

drink. But the wind was so bad

17:40

that it would just blow it. So none of the rain

17:43

was actually getting in their mouth. So it's like getting taunted

17:46

with a little bit of water on your tongue,

17:48

but not actually getting to drink anything.

17:52

One of Deborah said it was like

17:55

God was spitting on us. And

17:58

so then they spend the rest of that.

17:59

They might try and sleep, but every time

18:02

they'd get close to falling asleep, the

18:04

dinghy would get bumped and they'd

18:06

look in and see a fin in the water because

18:08

sharks were constantly bumping

18:10

the dinghy all night, like trying

18:12

to, like,

18:14

you know, I guess, tip it over. I'm not sure.

18:16

They've stuck with them for that long. Yeah.

18:20

Just... Was Meg still alive

18:22

at this point? Oh, yeah.

18:26

So the next day, things are looking

18:28

very grim. It's boiling hot during

18:31

the days. As cold as it is

18:33

at night, it's boiling hot in the day. The sun

18:35

is beating down on them. They're starting

18:37

to suspect that that Mayday

18:40

call that they got put through just never maybe

18:43

went through, because they were like, if it did, the Coast Guard

18:45

would have found us by now. They're

18:47

worried that maybe, like, the radio

18:49

just wasn't working and that they're

18:51

freaking out. The bottom of the dinghy

18:54

is filled with, like, this layer of

18:56

putrid water that's made up of

18:58

blood and urine and pus

19:01

from Meg's wounds. Oh.

19:03

Oh. And it smells. And

19:05

they're all in a lot of pain, and they're all

19:07

starting to get staph infections because

19:10

the bacteria from the water is getting

19:12

into all their wounds. And

19:15

Meg is pretty clearly dying of

19:17

blood poisoning, Deborah says. Like, she's not

19:20

in a good way. So things are

19:22

not great. They're not ideal, Jacob.

19:24

LAUGHTER Survival

19:27

instincts kick in at this point, and alliances

19:29

start to form. So Deborah and Brad

19:32

are down one end of the dinghy,

19:34

and Captain John, Mark

19:36

and Meg are down the other. And they formed, like,

19:39

these two little opposing groups. And

19:41

Deborah said that she and Brad decided to look out

19:43

for each other because they were like, we need

19:46

a purpose. So if my purpose is

19:48

to make sure you are safe and yours is to make

19:50

sure I am safe, that will give

19:52

us some kind of motivation to survive.

19:56

And meanwhile, the other three down that end were

19:58

just losing it. Like, Meg... is wailing

20:00

in pain, she can't really move. John

20:03

and Mark alternate between screaming

20:05

and crying. So that's the dynamic

20:08

as we head in to night three. Everyone's

20:10

just feeling a bit delirious, exhausted.

20:14

And Deborah and Brad are sleeping down their

20:16

little section of the dinghy and they wake

20:18

up in the middle of the night to see Captain John

20:21

and Mark drinking seawater.

20:23

Like just shoveling it into their mouths

20:25

like they're possessed, crazed,

20:28

just shoveling it in. And they're like,

20:29

guys, stop, stop. You can't drink seawater

20:32

because drinking seawater is

20:34

the worst thing you can possibly do. It makes

20:37

you

20:37

even more dehydrated because it's filled with salt.

20:39

It also messes with your kidneys and liver. It

20:42

very quickly makes you delusional and you

20:44

will end up dead. And

20:46

it's the most torturous thing because when you're stuck out

20:48

at sea and you're dying of thirst, you're surrounded of

20:51

water that you can't drink. But

20:54

like Deborah said, it was like they had just snapped

20:56

mentally and they were just shoveling it into

20:58

themselves.

20:59

And she's like, oh my God, they are going to

21:02

lose it, which they do. So

21:04

over the course of that night and the next day, Captain

21:07

John and Mark start to completely

21:09

unravel. They start talking to

21:11

themselves. They're having full conversations

21:14

with people who aren't there. They're reverting

21:16

back to being like little toddlers. Sometimes

21:19

they're behaving like animals, like literally

21:21

growling on all fours. They'll

21:24

like cry and laugh maniacally,

21:26

within the space of 30 seconds. They

21:29

keep convincing themselves they can see land.

21:32

It's very scary and Deborah says it's like

21:35

watching a movie of crazy people, but

21:37

she made a conscious decision to ignore it

21:39

because she's like, if I'm arguing with

21:41

them all day and constantly explaining to

21:43

them, no, there's not land over there. No,

21:46

you're not at your grandma's house. She's

21:48

like, it'll just waste my energy and I can't,

21:50

I need to conserve my energy. So she said

21:53

she and Brad just had to sit back and watch as

21:56

they just

21:56

completely mentally broke down. And

21:59

then, And then all of a sudden, Captain John

22:02

says, hey guys, I'm just gonna get my

22:04

car, I'll be back in one second. And

22:06

he steps off the side of the dinghy. Oh

22:09

no. And they're like, dude, what the F, get

22:11

back in. And he swims

22:13

about five meters away from them. And

22:16

then he sort of, they can't really see him

22:19

through the waves. And then they hear this blood

22:21

curdling scream. They see him jerk

22:24

up and then he disappears under

22:26

the water. Oh. And

22:28

a shark got him. And that's

22:31

when they realize the sharks haven't

22:33

attacked us because

22:35

they've been here the whole time like vultures. They're

22:38

just waiting for us to die. Oh.

22:40

And

22:43

they float there for a few more hours

22:45

in silence.

22:47

Captain John's gone. Meg

22:50

is despondent because he was her boyfriend,

22:52

the only person she knew. Then

22:54

Deborah wakes up later that day and

22:56

sees that down the other end of the dinghy, Mark,

22:59

who has also completely lost his mind,

23:01

this is awful, is

23:03

attempting to, or what looks like,

23:06

he's attempting to sexually assault Meg.

23:09

So he's telling her like, oh,

23:12

kind of like he's met a woman at a club. He

23:14

seems to think in his mind, he's like, oh,

23:17

I think you're so hot. I

23:19

wanted you from the moment you got on the yacht.

23:21

I can make you feel good. Let

23:24

me do this. And he's trying to untie

23:26

her pants. Meg is just paralyzed.

23:28

She's got blood poisoning. She's practically comatose.

23:32

And so she's just sitting there still while Mark

23:34

is like acting completely

23:36

bizarrely. And so Deborah wakes

23:38

up rad. She's like, we've got to do something. So they start

23:41

yelling at him like, stop, stop.

23:43

And then he turns to them and he says, yeah,

23:46

okay, yeah, yeah, I'm just

23:48

going to go to the 7-Eleven and get more

23:50

beer and cigarettes. And then he stands

23:52

up, steps off the side of the boat. And

23:57

what happens next is petrifying because

23:59

they

23:59

got a taste of Captain John just a few

24:02

hours before. Like they were on it

24:04

this time. The second he stepped

24:06

into the water, he is grabbed.

24:08

He screams. They pull him under. Deborah

24:11

says the boat starts shaking like,

24:14

you know, they're in a washing machine.

24:16

The water around them is bubbling like

24:18

a spa bath and it goes a deep red.

24:21

And they're like, oh my God. Like he's literally

24:24

being torn to shreds directly

24:26

beneath us. And

24:29

after that, the sharks become way more brazen.

24:32

They've got a taste. They've eaten two dudes now

24:34

and they're like, they just want to eat more. So now

24:37

they start actually trying to tip

24:38

the boat over. They're like going

24:40

at it and banging it and trying. And

24:42

they don't know what to do. So they just, yeah,

24:44

they just all curl up and sleep.

24:47

That night, Deborah

24:49

and Brad are woken by

24:51

a Meg who is sitting up

24:54

and alert and which

24:56

she hasn't been in days and staring

24:58

at them with her eyes really wide,

25:01

growling like a

25:02

dog. And they're looking

25:04

at her like, what? And

25:06

then all of a sudden, like a horror movie,

25:09

she crawls on all floors,

25:11

lunges at Brad and starts clawing

25:14

at his face and screaming

25:16

and growling like a zombie. Like

25:19

Deborah said, it was like a zombie was attacking

25:21

him. He pushes her off

25:24

and she sits in the middle of the dinghy just

25:27

talking gibberish. Like Deborah

25:29

said, it sounded like she was talking in tongues.

25:31

Like she's just going, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And

25:34

then she starts,

25:35

you know, when you and I do that funny

25:37

thing where we pretend we're a fetus, we like float

25:40

our hands in there. So Deborah

25:42

said she kind of started doing that and she

25:44

was just looking at, it was like her

25:47

fingers were magical. Like she was just

25:49

couldn't stop staring at them. And

25:53

Deborah was like, oh my God, we're watching someone die.

25:55

Like she's dying. And so

25:57

she's just talking to herself and acting weird.

25:59

Brad and Deborah fall asleep.

26:02

And when they wake up in the morning, Meg

26:04

is dead in the bottom of the dinghy. And

26:07

then she and Brad are

26:09

like, okay,

26:11

we have to have this conversation. Is

26:16

there any feasible way we can

26:19

butcher and eat her because

26:21

we are starving? Oh. And

26:25

then they're like, we really can't,

26:28

not because they can't,

26:31

like, you know, morally or whatever, but

26:34

because they're like, she died

26:36

of blood poisoning, like to eat

26:37

her body. She's got septicemia, yeah, she's toxic.

26:40

Yeah, it would be to eat something toxic. So

26:43

they're like, well, we just, she's not edible

26:45

anyway. So they

26:47

decide, they also decide they

26:50

need to get her off the dinghy because she's

26:52

just, her flesh is rotting

26:54

and she's poison. And so

26:57

they take all her clothes

26:59

off and her jewelry off because

27:01

they think maybe her family will want them. And

27:04

they have her naked on the edge of the

27:06

dinghy. They say a few

27:08

words. They said they say the Lord's Prayer. And

27:10

then they just gently roll her into the water.

27:13

And then they immediately like lie down

27:15

in the boat because they don't want to see the sharks

27:17

take her. But about 30 seconds later,

27:19

they start hearing the flashing, like

27:22

splashing frenzy. And so they

27:24

know what's happening. This is so much

27:26

darker than I could have imagined it was going to be.

27:28

I know. Do you understand now

27:30

how I don't know how to name it? Like,

27:34

I honestly don't know what to call it. I

27:36

don't know what I'm gonna title this episode.

27:38

The survivors

27:40

of the trash man. I don't know.

27:43

The trash man disaster. Later

27:45

that day, Deborah

27:46

and Brad decide they need

27:48

to try and flip the dinghy over

27:51

because the water in the bottom is definitely

27:53

making them sick. Like it's just filled

27:55

with bacteria, all that gross

27:57

stuff. And so they're...

28:00

like, you know what, we're at risk

28:02

of sharks, but if we do it really fast,

28:04

if we just flip it, the

28:06

water will come out, flip it back, quickly get in, hopefully,

28:09

you know, it's worth

28:11

the risk because this water is going to kill us, this disgusting

28:14

pus-filled blood water. So

28:17

Brad is standing up on the edge of the dinghy

28:19

and he's pulling it, and

28:20

as he's pulling it, he falls into

28:22

the water. He

28:25

doesn't have the energy to pull

28:27

himself back into the dinghy, and

28:30

Deborah doesn't have the energy to

28:32

pull him into the dinghy, and he's

28:34

like screaming, help me, help me the sharks,

28:37

and she just is so defeated,

28:40

she crawls over to the other side of the dinghy and

28:42

is just staring at him crying, like she

28:44

just doesn't know what to do. And

28:48

then suddenly... Derna.

28:52

Derna. He masters the strength and manages to hoist

28:54

himself in. Oh! Oh!

29:01

I can't tell you how tense I have been for the last 30 minutes

29:03

listening to this. I know, I

29:05

know. And he is pissed

29:07

at her because he was like, we had this

29:09

promise, we were going to help each other, and we've

29:12

had this alliance for five days now, and

29:14

the alliance, yeah, this is their fifth day

29:16

there, and the alliance they've had just

29:18

at that point collapses because he's like,

29:21

F, you, you just were going to let me

29:23

die. And so then they move to opposite

29:25

ends of the dinghy, and they're suspicious

29:27

of each other, and it reminds me of

29:30

that episode of The Simpsons where

29:32

Mr. Burns and Homer are stuck

29:34

in the log

29:35

cabin, and at first they really get along,

29:37

but then by the end they're like at

29:40

war, and hiding in opposite

29:42

ends, just staring at each other. It

29:44

was kind of what they did, but on opposite

29:46

ends of the dinghy. And

29:48

so they pretty much just sit there in silence

29:50

and wait to die because the only thing

29:53

that really had kept them alive until

29:56

this point was each other. And

29:58

then Deborah, his Brad say,

30:00

oh

30:01

my God, Deborah, a ship. And

30:03

she's like, there is no ship. Like

30:06

you're delirious. Stop going

30:08

on about the ships. We're never gonna get to them anyway. And

30:10

he's like, no, Deborah, look, look,

30:13

a ship. And she turns around and there is

30:15

a ship like 50

30:17

meters away from them, this huge

30:19

ship. And they start waving

30:22

and this crew member looks at them like, what

30:24

the F? And then all these other

30:26

crew members come out and they're like, what?

30:28

And so they like throw like

30:31

a,

30:31

you know, the blow

30:33

up tire on the rope, the life

30:36

raft. Life ring, life saver. Life ring, yes,

30:38

that they throw that in. Deborah

30:40

just jumps out of the dinghy, starts

30:43

swimming towards it. Brad's like, okay,

30:45

and he starts swimming towards it. They grab onto

30:47

it.

30:48

They are winched up onto this

30:51

ship. And then they

30:53

realize from them talking

30:55

that it's Russians, they're Russian soldiers, and

30:57

they just lay them gently down on the deck. And

31:00

I love because it was the eighties and they're American,

31:02

Deborah's like, I realized they were Russian

31:04

and I didn't even care. Just

31:07

very sweet. They

31:11

were kind of

31:12

hating each other at the time, I think.

31:14

The Cold War was still going on, wasn't it? Yeah, it

31:16

was, I think. I don't know about dates

31:18

of things. Do you know where they actually

31:21

washed up? Like were they still in American

31:23

waters or? Yes, they were. So

31:26

they obviously survived.

31:29

And they had gone about something

31:32

like 140

31:33

or 50

31:37

kilometers out to sea. So

31:39

they'd, and when you're in a yacht, you're generally

31:41

pretty close to the coastline. And

31:43

the reason the Coast

31:45

Guard had not come looking for them is

31:48

because somebody radioed from

31:50

their yacht, forget

31:52

the last, like ignore the last order.

31:55

We don't need rescuing,

31:56

like stand down. We've got it

31:58

sorted. So

32:00

what they think that it

32:03

was maybe mark because he was

32:05

the one who was angriest about the fact They

32:07

were like

32:09

giving in and I His

32:13

male pride Yeah

32:15

stopped them from being rescued this whole

32:17

thing could have been avoided if it weren't

32:19

his ego. Oh

32:23

Yeah

32:26

So Brad went on to

32:29

become a boat captain and Spent

32:32

his career doing that and often sailed

32:34

the exact same route that they had sailed

32:37

Deborah wrote a book about

32:39

her experience called Albatross

32:41

the true story of a woman's survival

32:43

at sea Which was like a hit at

32:45

the time and she did the rounds like she'd Larry

32:48

King should all the shows She

32:50

became a motivational speak speaker Her

32:53

book was turned into the film to

32:55

came back with Stonehart

32:57

and Jonathan Brandis who was also

32:59

a bit of a heartthrob back then I

33:02

remember him. Yeah Yes, I was

33:04

for his stories quite sad actually

33:07

Jonathan Brandis. He was sea

33:09

quest was that he was in sea quest he

33:11

was also in the original

33:14

telly movie of it

33:16

Was one of the kids in the first one

33:18

yes The

33:21

episode I watched of I shouldn't be

33:23

alive was filmed in Brad

33:26

was still a boat captain then although I guess

33:29

Probably would have retired by now if these

33:31

guys were born in the 50s ish. Oh

33:34

for sure. Yeah. Yeah Deborah

33:37

died in 2012. She was 54

33:41

It's not revealed in her obituary

33:43

how she died But

33:46

I did a bit of digging because I wanted to know

33:48

and I I you can

33:50

you can find it if you look So

33:52

I won't say here because I think you

33:55

know her family kept it out of the obituary

33:57

for a reason but But

33:59

yes She died in 2012, age 54, which is very sad. That's

34:03

very young. And that is the

34:05

story of one of the craziest

34:08

survival tales

34:09

I've

34:12

ever heard. It

34:14

would be really hard for anyone to top

34:17

that. Yes, that was absolutely

34:19

wild. When I was watching this

34:21

on I Shouldn't Be Alive, I was just

34:23

like, oh, they're seeing, can they be at sea? But

34:25

it just keeps getting, and then

34:27

this happens, and then this happens, and then this

34:29

happens, and then you're

34:31

like, what? How

34:33

can one more terrible thing happen?

34:36

Like it's just awful,

34:40

awful, awful. Whenever

34:42

I hear stories like this or watch movies

34:44

with this sort of plot line, I'm constantly thinking

34:46

to myself, okay, at what point would I just end

34:49

it for myself? And I know that that sounds

34:51

really morbid, but at some point

34:53

pretty early on probably, I would have just tossed

34:56

myself to the sharks.

34:57

Dude, do you wanna know what's more morbid than

34:59

that? I know whenever I ask myself that question 20

35:02

minutes in. Yeah. Like whenever

35:05

I watch things like The Walking Dead or

35:07

disaster movies, I'd be like, you

35:09

know what? I just, when would

35:11

I give it all in, give it all up?

35:14

And it would just be very,

35:16

very early in the pace, let me tell ya. Same,

35:19

I'm just not a fighter like that. Me

35:22

either, I'm just like, I'm good, I'm

35:24

good. I mean, even

35:26

just being in a boat in the middle

35:29

of a storm is torture if you've ever experienced

35:31

that, have you? Well, I've been

35:34

on a boat in, I get incredibly

35:37

badly seasick. So I can be on a boat

35:39

that's even rocking the tiniest bit and it's

35:42

torture, but I've been on a boat in

35:44

extremely scary, rocky

35:47

seas. And I think

35:49

if I wasn't sick out

35:51

of my mind, I would have been scared,

35:54

but I was just concentrating on the fact I was

35:56

vomiting every two seconds. Have

35:59

you?

35:59

A big, big

36:02

mess up. One time I went on a 10 day sailing

36:05

trip around the Whitsundays and

36:08

pre-internet kind of, so

36:10

sort of similar technology levels. My

36:13

uncle misunderstood the weather prediction.

36:15

And so he parked us for the night

36:18

in a bay that then just got hit straight

36:21

on by a really wild storm. So

36:23

the waves were like six meters. And

36:27

the boat was just being tossed

36:29

around. In this lake, you literally,

36:31

you could not move. And where you were,

36:34

like you'd just try to lie down in the bed

36:36

and literally rolling from side to side

36:38

in the bed all night long because you couldn't

36:40

get up and move the boat until daybreak.

36:43

And even

36:46

that, had I had access to some

36:48

sort of firearm, I probably would have

36:50

opted out at that stage. And

36:53

that's without all of the septicemia

36:55

and the zombies and

36:57

the, um, threats.

36:59

No, thanks. Not interested.

37:03

Not worth it. I,

37:06

I'm outie 5,000. So

37:10

yeah, that's that. Hopefully by Friday,

37:12

I'll figure out what to call this bloody thing. It's

37:15

just nuts. Maybe I should

37:17

call it that.

37:19

Trust me, it's just nuts. Yeah.

37:23

Do you know why Deborah called her book Albatross?

37:26

No, I figured it had some meaning

37:28

about the sea. Do Albatross's

37:31

survive? Albatri? Albatrossy?

37:35

I thought they would just be birds who did big poops.

37:39

Oh, I thought there were a fish. Oh. The

37:45

education system failed us. We'll

37:47

look into that. We'll

37:49

look into that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay,

37:51

cool. That was it.

37:53

Wow. That was mine. I'm gonna be thinking

37:55

about that for days. Yeah, it's nuts. And

37:57

go and watch the episode of I should.

38:00

It's on Amazon Prime. It's series one, episode

38:03

one. So they started

38:05

with a biggie. It's good. It's really good.

38:07

And the reenactments are a bit cheesy, but just very satisfying

38:09

to watch. And Deborah

38:12

and Brad both tell the story, like,

38:16

you know, as their 2005 selves, and

38:18

they're both very compelling storytellers. So

38:21

they tell the story really well about

38:23

what happened to them.

38:24

It's crazy. I'm on board. Love it. Yeah,

38:28

all right. All right. Well, love you. And

38:30

see you again next week. Cheers,

38:33

honey. Bye. Bye. Bye.