This Man Survived 3 Weeks Lost In The Jungle | I Shouldn't Be Alive S4 EP7 | Wonder

when benedict allen and his dog cashew set out on the adventure of a lifetime his childhood dream soon becomes a battle to survive suddenly i found the situation out of control it was having to fight for my life stranded and alone he must fight his way through 100 miles of the most inhospitable jungle on earth this place seemed intent on killing me he must face nature's most deadly predators terrifying waiting for something that was going to spring out at me and endure the madness induced by the forest this was a dream that i'd followed very selfishly and now it's going to be the death of me [Music] ah 22 year old benedict allen has always been a dreamer and he's living his biggest dream yet he's following in his father's footsteps and becoming an adventurer my dad was a test pilot and it was very exciting having this glamorous father used to fly these planes over the house and i just assumed that one day i'd been a venture of some sort just like my dad i just want to be like one of those great explorers like cook or hm stanley or livingston [Music] and for his first expedition benedict has come to the greatest wilderness on earth the mighty amazon rainforest [Music] as a child i read in my books about el dorado which was this mythical land of gold but no one found el dorado and i thought one day that would be my destiny [Music] his companion for this epic journey is a stray dog he's befriended along the way i was lonely and that dog reminded me of my dogs at home and i called him casu which was indian for dog so he was simply dog to me but he began to be more than a dog he began to be my friend despite his youthful enthusiasm this is benedict's first major adventure he's attempting to traverse over 1 000 miles of dense uncharted rainforest so he's relying heavily on two local guides to help him survive they taught me how to feel comfortable in the forest which to me was a confusing place [Music] they began to show me what i could eat and what i had to avoid how to hunt i was utterly dependent on these two men and their extraordinary library of knowledge because i knew nothing you know absolutely nothing [Music] for three months they head deeper into the vast rainforest and are nearing the supposed location of el dorado the city of gold but benedict has been warned of the dangerous illegal miners that have been drawn here and there are troubling indications that they are not alone signs were ominous from the beginning the water just empty cachaca bottles and sort of cheap rum there was a sense that there were outsiders in the forest i'd been warned that these were bank robbers thieves people accused of murder they'd all headed off into the forest because here's a chance of making a quick buck despite benedict's trepidation they must find a place to camp as night is falling we went off through the trees and suddenly we stumbled across this small settlement but whereas i was worried my two indian guides were absolutely entranced i remember one of the indian guys picking up a can opener i'm wondering what that was suddenly this character mendes arrived he was the classic gold miner and i just felt i've got to get out of here in tonses [Music] el dorado [Music] los said to me look i'll be your guide i'll take you down the river towards el dorado furthermore i know a track you'll be at a walk from the river to the outside world and i thought well maybe i've misjudged this gold miner maybe isn't that bad but i thought i should go along with this plan i'll be heading in the right direction at least okay [Music] benedict reluctantly agrees to the offer and settles down for the night but as the night wears on he has a growing sense that all is not what it seems that night i woke up in my hammer feeling that something was wrong [Music] just an uneasy feeling and i remember thinking i've got to check on things [Music] so i put on my boots potted down to the river to see if my canoe was still there see my supplies were there i think effectively i was making sure that my exit was okay i heard this conversation going on between eduardo mendes and they were discussing me they were saying why don't we go slit his throat right now [Music] i had a rising sense of fear and adrenaline began thumping in my ears and i realized i'm just going to be killed it's my last moment to live i just thought go run get out of here gather my hammer together my mosquito net ran to the canoe and suddenly i was in the darkness in my canoe with my dog and with his loyal friend cashew benedict makes it away from danger my first thought was relief that i had this terrible dawning realization that i wasn't safe at all i was surrounded by forest it was middle of the night and i was very very alone without his guides benedict is now stranded in over two million square miles of rainforest with no one to show him the route out i really was not at the end of a nightmare but at the beginning of one scarf i paddled up river for maybe an hour and i thought just calm down i'll just pull into the side made a little camp and thought i've got to come to terms with this new situation and the situation was my childhood dreams were over and i felt i've got to get out of here i got to get out of here [Music] and there was blood pounding through my head and did not know what was out there in the forest and i didn't know myself really i didn't know whether i had it in me to survive as the first light came up i could see this forest absolutely immense and there i was in the middle of it absolutely alone it was terrifying that first morning but after a little while i thought no come on pull yourself together it's the first day so i began looking at my supplies trying to work out whether i had enough to get me out of the forest good boy and by benedict's estimations he has enough rice sugar and dried meat to last him approximately two weeks and he has a mosquito net a machete and a survival kit all the basics he needs to stay alive if i wanted to see my mum and dad again i was going to have to take a chance on finding a trail out of the forest and that's the option that seemed to be the only sensible one but benedict knows that searching for a route out of the forest means heading off into completely uncharted waters [Music] i was actually going into the interior i was heading up river so for the moment until i found that trail i was heading into oblivion as i paddled the way upstream i was feeling more hopeful then suddenly there were rapids i remember thinking come on benedict pull yourself together you've got to get out of here spent a lot of time dragging the canoe through the rapids it was immensely hard work it just seemed relentless that i was just fighting all the time this river so [Music] after three days on the river fighting countless sets of rapids the harsh reality is sinking in for benedict he's heading deeper and deeper into the forest and there is still no sign of the trail by the third day all my early enthusiasm had drained away i kept on thinking how many rapids are there they weren't marked on any map just seemed relentless physically i felt a wreck my hands were in ribbons and blisters all over the place burns from this rope the big question mark was how long i could keep on going and it wasn't that i was running out of food i was just running out of belief in myself [Music] by mid-afternoon it seems benedict and cashew have cleared the worst of the rapids they can now continue to search for a way out of the forest i remember starting to paddle my way into the clear water but i haven't quite got far enough suddenly i found the situation out of control it started going backwards it became absolutely terrifying i realized that i was fighting for my survival i had to keep this canoe upright but then wham the canoe shattered with the impact everything now ended up in the water the dog the supplies and me it was a moment of absolute terror as i realized not only was i losing my possessions but actually i was having to fight for my life i was gagging on the water trying to get my breath finally got some purchase and waded my way towards the riverbank i remember just trying to take in the situation and the situation was that i'd lost virtually everything i needed in order to survive and lost my companionship kashu the dog yeah it was a sad moment just because he was my friend my companionship he was everything to me [Music] and as benedict sits on the riverbank he realizes that along with cashew his hopes of survival are slowly drifting away first thing that struck me was i didn't have any food then i realized i didn't have a hammock didn't have my mosquito net there's so many who worries going through my head would i end up starving to death would i die slowly of malaria it was difficult to imagine how i was going to end up but whatever way it didn't look likely that i'd ever seen my family again benedict knows that no one will be looking for him because his expedition is not due to finish for at least three months and with no food or medical supplies he'll be lucky to survive a week [Music] the situation was beautifully clear in in a way if i stayed where i was i thought i would just die i thought i've just got to get out of this place i thought what have i got get me out of the forest there's an old rucksack there was a water bottle a machete but above all my survival kit fishing hooks fishing line distress flares spare compass so key simple things i got out my little notebook and i made a little map anything i can remember put onto this map benedict realizes that the river is no longer a viable route and the only possible way out is to walk directly into the jungle and attempt to hike out on foot so i drew a little dotted line and that would be my route out of the forest [Music] and it was a huge huge moment as i walked away from the sunlight into the unknown [Music] and benedict heads into one of the most inhospitable places on earth the amazon rainforest [Music] the forest that i saw seemed a very different forest from when i remembered very very thick difficult to get through and so i thought i've got to keep absolutely clear about what i meant to be doing benedict realizes that traversing this jungle will be a monumental task so he'll have to use every last scrap of experience he has if he is to make it through here alive and i reckon i walked absolutely straight maybe 100 miles that would take me to the outside world so i thought i'm going to count every single pace when i got to 100 paces i made a little notch and a stick and that way i'd know that i was near a help [Music] for hours benedict fights his way through the jungle but as night falls he can go no further and when the sun goes down the searing temperatures plummet so he makes a shelter using a technique he learned from his guides i thought oh it doesn't look too bad really i just felt a little bit of pride [Music] and then lay down and realize that i was wet there's more dampness coming up from the ground [Music] i lay there sweating away and then felt incredibly cold the brutal reality is that benedict isn't prepared for this at all in the 100 humidity he has no way of keeping dry or warm and with his mosquito net gone no way to protect himself against the deadly disease he fears the most malaria then the insects started moving in and long night began [Music] so i was feeling absolutely terrible wrung out because i've been awake all night with the insects and i had to light a fire and dry out my clothes just to fend off this clawing wetness which wore you down i felt very burdened by by the forest i just thought i've got to get out i've got to get out of this place benedict resumes his hike towards the outside world but so far has only managed four of the 100 miles he has to traverse it's been four days since he last ate and he's beginning to weaken i was starting to feel hunger pains and i knew that unless i sorted out some sort of way of getting food i was just gonna die of starvation i started to think how i could get nourishment from this place that seemed intent on killing me so i thought okay i've got to settle myself down and build a few traps and benedict knows that if you want to trap an animal you have to find its trail [Music] you make two parallel lines of sticks that you jab into the forest floor and you funnel them mouse along and there's a little bit of bait that you put at the end and it triggers a mechanism and boom a log comes down and flattens the mouse and you get this flat rodent for your [Music] supper [Music] it's so time consuming to even fashion these things but waiting for an animal to come along i found absolutely exasperating i thought i'm totally incompetent here i don't belong in the forest and furthermore the forest seems to know it it's almost like i've been found out every species here has learned to survive and those who aren't good enough die and i'm going to be next because i don't know how to cope here i can't even make a simple trap [Applause] [Music] i began to dread every evening it's a question of trying to light fires that i had to find water to boil so i could drink it and all of this was taking time when i was already exhausted from trying to make progress through the forest [Music] i used to dread the loneliness of night and uh wish for the morning again but in the morning no relief i felt like a hamster on a treadmill heading to nowhere benedict has managed to fight his way through 25 miles of jungle a mere quarter of the distance he believes he needs to travel to reach the outside world the only food he's eaten are the tips of ferns but it's not enough and he's beginning to experience the first effects of starvation my hunger was really bad i felt weak i was doing less and less miles every day and feeling more more confused and weakened by hunger his body is becoming too frail to withstand the jungle's constant onslaught insects were more of a problem and so were the bites some of them were starting to fester and weep all of this was sort of visible evidence that i was being attacked and suddenly there was a palm tree [Music] there's a marija palm [Music] and i remembered how my guides had taken the berries and they made a wonderful purple mush suddenly had all the energy in the world because i saw hope now [Music] i drank down this wonderful nutritious liquid oh god it felt so good to have my stomach [Music] full benedict is so weak that his stomach is unable to digest this rich berry pulp and as starvation takes a stranglehold his body is beginning to break down it was a terrible situation because on the one hand i could eat but if i did eat i feel more sick i didn't seem to be solving any problem and it was a sort of hellish situation despite his sickness benedict pushes onwards but he's getting weaker by the hour and it's not just the result of malnutrition gradually i realized i was succumbing to something [Music] sweat was becoming more and more obvious to me looking at my hand i'd see it shaking and shaking [Music] i was thinking into a delusional state because i wasn't able to control my thoughts after almost two weeks of relentless attack benedict has finally succumbed to his biggest fear i thought this is the taste of malaria that i'd always be warned about and now it's my turn to experience it myself as someone who was exhausted and starting to starve to death the malarial parasites are destroying benedict's red blood cells starving his body and brain of oxygen and knowing he faces almost certain death in the forest his thoughts turned to his family over five thousand miles away was a sort of sadness at first feeling of terrible defeat i thought no one's going to be able to imagine what my last days were like and a feeling also of disappointment i'd be to my mum and dad but the truth was this was a dream that i'd followed very selfishly now it's going to be the death of me [Music] as the fever began to kick in my progress became evil slower and it's becoming a fight just to put one foot in front of the other and my hope of getting beyond the trees was was fading away [Music] suddenly i had this feeling that there was something out there as if something was stalking me i thought come on bender keep control you're losing it you're losing it suddenly i heard this russell and my worst fear was that it was a jaguar and it was terrifying waiting for something that was going to spring out at me come on i fired off a couple of distress flares and nothing but then i heard a whimpering sound [Music] incredibly after vanishing in the rapids two weeks before cashew has tracked his old friend through 40 miles of rainforest and all at once the horrors of his situation seem to drift away suddenly felt like i'd been given a miracle a sign of hope that everything was going to be okay again [Music] i had someone who could understand what i was going through that restored a lot of myself somehow that i'd lost that have been taken away by the brutality of the forest [Music] cashew's reappearance has lifted benedict's spirits and reinvigorated his determination to get home but he's desperately malnourished fighting a killer disease and rapidly running out of time now all three weeks into this trek three weeks of really hardly eating anything after walking for 70 miles benedict is now in the advanced stages of starvation and the malarial parasites are rapidly colonizing and destroying his body he knows that his condition is reaching critical and i was so aware that i was running out of time cashews seemed to be lagging more and more behind and i thought i can't have you as a passenger [Music] i began to think hold on there's all this flesh on you [Music] [Music] but it was inconceivable that he could ever be my food [Music] question as the day wore on i began pining for water and i realized i wasn't just starving i was dehydrated benedict's life is now hanging in the balance the combined effects of starvation and malaria mean that he must take on more and more fluid but it's becoming ever harder to find and whereas a normal person can last three days without water in his condition he won't last 24 hours i was desperately licking leaves i was licking stones just to get a bit of water into my system just to sustain myself [Music] i found myself side by side with the dog actually lapping water like a dog [Music] i thought the animal in me is coming out in order to persevere i'm coming like you cashier i was in a desperate state by now it was almost impossible just to keep on walking it was a real crisis point mentally and less of a grip on what was going on where i was whether it was day or night what was happening what was my imagination it was very very clear that i had less and less sense of who i was by now benedict is so emaciated and the malaria is so advanced his brain is beginning to shut down and as his clarity and sense of self dissolves he knows that his death is creeping ever closer i was in blind terror really that these were my last sane hours [Music] i write repeatedly no need to die no need to die no need to die and benedict realizes that unless he eats immediately this could very well be his last day alive one way or another at the moment came when i just thought this is it this is the day day when i can actually gather myself together pick up my machete and kill the dog without the nutrition that cashew will provide benedict is a dead man he now has no choice but to kill his only friend it felt like i was an executioner at this stage but i remember this terrible cowardness of walking up behind it knowing i couldn't actually face killing the dog in front i struck you to blow on the head from [Music] behind suddenly there was a way out of this hell [Music] for now i concentrate on the most nutritious parts the kidneys liver heart and i put them on the fire i just sort of quietly ate them and once another sorrowfully actually but benedict cannot ingest the meat the malaria is making his stomach reject anything he forces into it and the realization dawns he's just used his last chance when i thought it couldn't get any worse it did get worse lay on the forest floor racked by pain my liver my kidneys were being attacked fighting just to keep myself sane [Music] benedict malaria has now reached the final and fatal stage the parasites are aggressively multiplying and destroying his vital organs causing his body to collapse within 24 hours he will experience first coma then death this was the moment when it could all end very very quickly i had this rising sense of panic that i had to get out of the forest i had to do whatever it took [Music] whatever happened i had to keep moving keep on putting one foot in front of the other i kept on going making pitiful progress and sometimes no progress at all i couldn't even think straight i couldn't even see my compass at that moment i suddenly thought well i'm just never going to get out of here it's just too big to fight and i was losing that fight [Music] benedict simply cannot go on he's just too weak too ravaged by disease it was a terribly lonely moment of thinking this is the end and suddenly amongst all this despairs confusion this feeling of being trapped in this prison a sight that will always stay with me [Music] i saw this cut branch [Music] the cut itself was blackened so it had been cut some time ago but had been cut by a human i realized there was actually quite a few of these branches this was actually the edge of the outside world i started investigating and there was a trail and then extraordinary thing of just seeing um daylight and it's still emotional to me just this reconnection with the outside world [Music] the one thing i've been looking forward to praying for imagining was suddenly there and it was absolutely overwhelming and i found myself in the back of a garden there ahead of me was a little hut and there was a little man in front he was standing there with a look not of welcome but of horror and that was my last memory having recognized the symptoms of malaria the farmer nursed benedict for three days before he was driven to a hospital in macapa where he made a full recovery benedict returned home to be reunited with his parents one week later my life was never the same again and benedict has been exploring the world ever since fulfilling his dreams of becoming a renowned adventurer just like his father i've been going off to the jungle going off to the desert going off to the arctic pushing myself to the limit trying to touch that experience that i had that was so profound that has always haunted me and it's something that'll always be with me and it steered the rest of my life [Music] you

Channel: Wonder

Views: 2,718,991

Rating: 3.8774767 out of 5

Keywords: wonder, i shouldn't be alive, i shouldn't be alive full episodes, wonder i shouldn't be alive

Id: O0mjZKExLU8

Length: 48min 8sec (2888 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 25 2018