Chapters
Shownotes Transcript
From Wondery, I'm Mike Corey and this is Against the Odds. On our latest episodes, we told the story of two cameramen and a pilot who went on what was supposed to be a routine flight over an active volcano on the big island of Hawaii. They were there to shoot footage for a Hollywood movie, but their helicopter crashed inside the Kilauea volcano, leaving the men stranded in a hot crater full of noxious gases.
Each of them went through his own life or death struggle to escape, especially the two cameramen who found themselves forced to spend the night trapped inside a crater on one of the most active volcanoes on Earth.
Joining us today is one of those cameramen, Christopher Duddy, who served as a consultant on this series. A sought-after cinematographer, Duddy began his career at ILM, or Industrial Light and Magic. He's worked on many films, including The Abyss, Total Recall, and Terminator 2. Duddy just wrapped up shooting season four of the hit CBS show Magnum P.I., which had him back in Hawaii.
Chris Duddy, welcome to Against the Odds. Thank you for having me. I got to ask, man, sometimes if you have a story this good, do you hesitate to tell it? I mean, you know, this story is so over the top, and I've been telling the story. We're coming up on the 30-year anniversary of it, and I've told the story so many times now, but
For a while, when I would start telling the story and I'd see people's reactions, it felt like I was making it up. Like I was making up a story because people would look at me like, what? You've crashed in a volcano and you were trapped? It just sounds unreal. Like too much. How could it possibly be real? How could it possibly? Yeah. Yeah.
So give us a little bit of a recap because some of us might be tuning in for the first time. How did you find yourself in a helicopter over an active volcano? Yeah, we were shooting a second unit for a movie called Sliver, which was starring Billy Baldwin and Sharon Stone. We were shooting in 1992.
And the second unit required us to go to Hawaii to shoot aerial footage near and around the active volcano Kilauea. We had been shooting for about a week, and we had to pause several times for weather because that side of the island is the rainy side. So...
The day of the crash, we got the green light early in the morning to get out there and start shooting because we had good weather and it wasn't going to last long. So to get these specific shots, needed to fly over the volcano and kind of dip down into it for the ending of the movie. And we did one take...
And we landed about a mile away from the cone and assessed the shot, looked at the video playback of the shot. And Mike Benson, the director of photography on that shoot, wanted to do another take because he thought we could do it better. You know, always you want to do a couple, two, three takes just to have protection.
So we loaded back up and made the approach for the second take. And that's when all hell broke loose. Yeah, to put it lightly. Had you been around volcanoes before this? Actually, a year before, I was hired to go shoot plates at the same exact volcano on a little movie, a little indie movie called Nemesis. When you say plates, what do you mean?
background plays that they would put composite something into it. Like they would composite some other element into the shot.
So I did, but I got up close and personal to that same exact volcano. So I was familiar with it. When I got the job to do Sliver with Mike and Craig, I was like, oh, I know that volcano. I've been there. I've flown over it before. This is going to be super cool. It's bitching out there. It's beautiful. I was excited about that job. Like, really, I remember prior to that, earlier in the morning...
We were doing this flyby on the coast where the lava tube shoots lava into the ocean right on the beach. And this great white plume comes up out of where the lava enters the water as it cools off. And we did this flyby of it about 50 feet above it. And I remember looking back and seeing the vortex of the plume spin as the rotor went through it and spinning.
It was exciting and I remember saying to myself, "I can't believe I'm getting paid right now." Right. You know, like I'm in a helicopter in Hawaii looking at this beautiful scenery and I'm getting paid.
In our fast-paced, screen-filled world, it can be all too easy to lose that sense of imagination and wonder. If you're looking for new ways to ignite your creativity and open your mind to fresh perspectives, then let Audible be your guide. Whether you listen to stories, motivation, or any genre you love,
you can be inspired to imagine new worlds, new possibilities, and new ways of thinking. There's more to imagine when you listen. Plus, as an Audible member, you'll get one title a month to keep from their entire catalog. If you're into mythology, then I recommend the title Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman. He's an amazing storyteller that narrates this unique version of the Norse myths.
Listen along. New members can try Audible free for 30 days. Visit audible.com slash the odds or text the odds to 500-500. That's audible.com slash the odds or text the odds to 500-500. Against the Odds is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.
What if comparing car insurance rates was as easy as putting on your favorite podcast? With Progressive, it is. Just visit the Progressive website to quote with all the coverages you want. You'll see Progressive's direct rate, then their tool will provide options from other companies so you can compare. All you need to do is choose the rate and coverage you'd like. Quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive.
Progressive Casualty Insurance Company & Affiliates. Comparison rates not available in all states or situations. Prices vary based on how you buy.
I heard this story about how you had a bottle of booze with you up there for a particular ritual. Can you tell us about that? Typically, you know, Hawaiians are very spiritual and they do these blessings before you fly in a helicopter. The production hired a local priest to come out and bless our shoot. And they wave tea leaves and, you know, they have this holy water and stuff and they bless it and they bless the helicopter. And then they gave us a
It's a gin bottle wrapped in tea leaves, and you're supposed to offer it to Madame Pele, which is the goddess of fire, who controls the volcanoes, right? That's the legend of Madame Pele. So that's the idea is you offer this bottle of gin.
And she lets you, you know, but she lets you live. You say, you say offer. You just whip it from the side of the helicopter down into the. Well, the idea was we were going to once we got up right near the cone, I would throw the bottle out into the volcano to make the offering right into the pool, into the pool of lava.
It's pretty big inside. I mean, imagine the cone inside there. It was about the size of, say, like a major football stadium, right? The lava pool takes up like an end zone size, if I'm using football stadium analogies, right? So I'm in the back seat, Mike and Craig are in the front seat, and the doors are off in the back. So I was designated to be the bottle tosser.
And I hear them both yell, now, now, throw it now. And I'm like, oh, oh. And I look up and I just grab the bottle and I just threw it out the side, you know. Yeah. And the air coming out of the cone is massive updraft of turbulent air coming up out of it. Really hot air with chemicals and all that stuff. It blew the bottle kind of back out and it smashed on the rim of the volcano. So it didn't actually go in. Uh-huh.
And when that bottle of gin smashed against the rim and didn't quite make it inside, was there any kind of like, okay, made a mistake or was it just kind of business as usual? You know, at the time we didn't think about it at all. It was just kind of a laugh. I didn't really think about it until maybe after, maybe a week later, it was like, oh, maybe the gin bottle had, maybe there was some, you know. Oh, actually, maybe there was something to that. Maybe there was something to that. I don't know. Yeah.
Okay, so you told us that you had already done one take of this shot. Can you recount to us what the crash was like when you came back around to the second take? So we get back in the helicopter. We fly back towards the cone. So as we were going over the lip and over the cone, you know, and there's a lot of smoke coming up out. So the visibility is not great for a minute, right? And I felt that turbulence again.
But this time it was a little different, and the tail section wiggled more than the first take. And then I heard Craig, the pilot, say, oh, shit. And that's something you really don't want to hear a pilot say ever. Never, yeah, ever. And I was looking down at the monitor when he said that, and I looked up, and we were in a whiteout. And then the next thing he said was, we're going down, hang on.
And then, like in a movie, it was like a movie in a movie, we come out of the plume and we're headed straight for the cliff. And Craig grabbed the joystick and he pulled to the right. So we started to bank to the right. And the rotor actually hit the cliff. Hmm.
And I heard this, this really powerful sound of like a smash pop sound. And then, and then we free fell, you know, from then on. And, and,
and crashed on a rightward motion hard hit on the bottom, but we were on the skids, so we landed on the skids. I'll never forget seeing Mike and Craig's bodies on the impact. They disappeared to the right. The impact jolted them to their right so severe that they disappeared for a second, and then when they came back up, then it stopped. And I remember Craig looking over at Mike, and he had gashed up.
his over, he had a gash over his eye. Cause he must've hit Mike's elbow or something. And he, and he immediately blood was just gushing down his face, but we were all okay. We, we, so we all, you know, we're all belted in. So was there like a platform? No, at that moment, honestly, I didn't know we were inside the volcano. I don't think any of us did because we were in the whiteout for a good 10 seconds before we came clear. And
Once we got out of the helicopter and we were looking around, then it became clear that we were at the bottom of the volcano. And we couldn't see the lava pool, but you could hear it and you could feel the heat from it. And immediately the...
Noxious fumes hit you and your eyes start burning and you your lung like it's hard to breathe like you take a you take a breath and you immediately start Uncontrollably coughing right? It's basically yeah, and so we were like oh
I remember looking at the helicopter. There was no rotor. The rotor was gone. The tail section had broken off and was laying on the ground. And the fuselage was just like a crushed beer can. And how far away was the pool, do you think? I believe we were about 50 yards from the lava pool. So, you know, immediately we were like, oh, shit, we're inside this thing. We've got to get out. We just were like, looked ahead, the closest parkway.
part of the cliff to us and we just went there and started to climb, you know, immediately just, we got to get out of here. Not knowing that, you know, here we are going to try to climb up at like a scale of 300 foot cliff. That's dried lava rock. That's crumbly and sharp. It's like grabbing on a broken glass, man.
Could you see the rim or just knew that up was the way to go? I mean, sort of, you know, the visibility was so intermittent because it would, the, the smoke and stuff was swirling around. Sometimes you could see clearly. And then other times, like a second later, it's like just the smoke swirls in and you can't see anything. And I remember like walking away from the helicopter too, like,
my feet crushing in the dry lava and steam shooting out where my feet crushed into it. And it was hot, you know? So it was like another reason we got to get the fuck out of here. And the three of you were together climbing? Well, initially we did, we started, we set out, we're like, okay, this looks like a way we could go. I kind of took the lead. So I went first and Mike started following me and then Craig was pulling up the rear.
And then once you get about halfway up, it's really almost 90 degree shear. So I had gotten to about that point and it became really difficult to climb because you would grab onto a rock and then once you put your weight onto it, it would just break off and crumble down. And so I got to this, I found this little ledge, about a four foot by two foot flat kind of spot.
And I could sit on it. And I just, I stopped for a minute. When we got up on the cliff like that, there was a pocket of air close to the cliff, the wall part, that you could actually breathe some decent air. It wasn't clean, but it was better than the noxious fumes. So...
I just, I stopped. And then I was like, I can't go anymore. And now at this point, I can't see Mike or Craig. And I yelled down to them. I said, don't come this way. I'm stuck. And then Craig just said, all right, let's just stop. Everybody stop where you're at. Let's just take a minute, take a breath, try to get some air. Let's just chill for a second and figure out what we're going to do.
So that's kind of where I ended up staying the next whatever, 26 hours or so just on that rock. What time of day was this when you decided to park it? I think we crashed. It was a little after 11 a.m. So now it's probably 1230 when we get to that point where we stopped and took a timeout. And then we were kind of yelling back and forth to each other like,
What the fuck are we going to do? Does anybody know we crashed? So then Craig said, I'm going to go back down to the helicopter and try to fix the radio. I could see the helicopter for a minute, and then the smoke would swirl around, and then it would disappear. It was like a bowl of soup. So I only really saw below me the crashed helicopter for the first maybe hour, and then I never saw it again because it just—
it just got worse and worse, the smoke. And there was a storm front coming in. All of it was just like, this is the worst case scenario possible. So anyway, yeah, so Craig gets down, back down to the helicopter, and he's coughing and throwing up. And I told him that I had a tool bag in the back seat, my camera tool bag, you know. And
So he got some tools out and he actually spliced the camera battery into the helicopter's radio and got the radio working. Wow, that's badass. And he started doing the mayday, mayday, mayday, mayday. Then it went out on, you know, 911 to everything and then the rescue started. But it was slow going because they didn't know exactly where we were in there, you know. And the visibility just kept getting worse and worse and worse and worse.
When you're hiring, time is of the essence. That's why more than 3.5 million businesses worldwide use Indeed to find exceptional talent fast. Indeed's powerful matching engine works quickly, so quickly that, according to Indeed data worldwide, every minute 23 hires are made on Indeed.
But it doesn't stop there, because Indeed also helps you hire better. 93% of employers agree Indeed delivers the highest quality matches compared to other job sites, according to a recent Indeed survey. That's because their matching engine is always learning from your preference. So the more you use Indeed, the better it gets.
So let Indeed be your go-to for making great hires quickly and easily. And listeners of the show, get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com slash the odds. Just go to Indeed.com slash the odds right now and support our show by saying you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com slash the odds. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed.
These days, it feels like we're all just on the hunt for ways to optimize our health and feel our absolute best. The only problem is, with all these supplements out there, it can be really tough to know which ones are actually worth your time and money. That's where today's sponsor Symbiotica comes in. Symbiotica is a premium supplement brand that's raising the bar when it comes to purity, potency, and efficacy. Their supplements are formulated with high-quality ingredients. That's why their formulas don't have any seed oils, preservatives,
toxins, artificial additives, or natural flavors. Plus, while most supplements can taste chalky or sulfuric, Symbiotica's supplements have amazing flavors like citrus lime, vanilla chai, or wild berry. I've been loving the magnesium supplement from Symbiotica. Being low in magnesium, I've made it a priority lately to take it consistently. I love how I can take it on the go and ensure I'm never missing a dose. Feel more energized, alert, and balanced with high-quality supplements that work.
Head over to Symbiotica.com and use code ODDS for 20% off and free shipping on your subscription order. How did Craig get rescued so quickly and you guys end up spending the night? The Volcano National Park Service Rangers, they jumped in their helicopters and they all flew over there to try to see what was going on. And there was the pilot that rescued Craig. He was hovering around the rim and
And Craig was like coughing and saying, I don't think I'm going to make it. I can't breathe. I can't breathe. I can't breathe. And that pilot was just the bravery of this guy. He just said, I can't not go in there and get this guy. So he just flew down in there, which he probably shouldn't have done because that's, you know, part of the reason we crashed is because of
You know, helicopters work on air intake. And if the oxygen, there's no oxygen, there's little oxygen in there. So it's pretty, it's pretty dangerous to fly a helicopter in that environment. So he flew in there and he hovered around through the smoke. Craig would guide him. And then finally he got close enough. Craig just ran over and jumped in his helicopter and they flew off. Could you hear that helicopter come? I heard it.
But then it, you know, then it went away and then we couldn't hear Craig anymore. I didn't know, we didn't know what happened. So we didn't know if we, we actually thought Craig died, Mike and I, because he, right before that, he was in a bad way. He was coughing and puking and spitting. And like, he was really, he was saying, I can't breathe. I can't breathe. You know, I gotta, I gotta get out of here. And
And then we hear this helicopter hovering and then the helicopter goes away and then we don't hear Craig anymore. So Craig didn't die. Craig made it out that day. However, you and Mike decided to do a little camping. We had to, yeah, it wasn't our decision, but yes, we had, we ended up having to.
And boy, did I wish I had that bottle of water that I left in the helicopter the whole time I was sitting there. I was like, why? I should have grabbed that bottle of water. Yeah, right. And you were there. I'm assuming the sun would set for you quite early because you're inside the rim of a volcano. So it would have gotten dark very quickly. And as that first night's closing in, man, what was going through your head?
I mean, it was just, it was the worst. Like it was just despair. And I just thought this, this is it. This is how I'm going out. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't open my eyes. I didn't know how they were going to get us out of there. They, the, you know, the weather was bad. It was all, everything was against us. You know, it was just, there wasn't much hope at that point. It was this, and this was in the,
right before Thanksgiving. So it's then that we're in the winter solstice. So it gets dark at five, five 30. Anyway, we did hear the rescuers get, they did send a ground crew up and they were yelling at us.
And we were yelling back. And at one point, I think it was around 430, they said, well, we're going to stop the rescue for now. And we'll come back at first light. And I remember that was the moment where I was like, oh, man, that's it. Game over. But they did say, they said, look, we're going to camp up here. And we'll check on you guys every hour or two.
we'll come and we'll blow a whistle. And can you guys whistle? And I said, yeah, I can whistle. I can do the fingers in the mouth whistle. And so they said, okay, we'll whistle. And then you whistle back if you're okay. And so that was the only kind of comforting thing that we had all night was every, you know, hour or so I'd hear that whistle and it just gave me a little hope, you know, like, okay, they're still there. It might be a silly question, but
How hot was it in there? Well, okay, it was... Initially, it was hot on the bottom. Right. But once we got up on the cliff, and then later that afternoon, it started raining. Right. So I was soaking wet. That's what I was thinking, yeah. Yeah, and I was in... I'm sure I was in some state of shock. Dehydration, too. Dehydration, all that. So I was actually... I remember...
Being in there all night was one of the most uncomfortable things I had ever gone through because not only was I sitting on a rock, my ass was killing me. I was shivering because I was soaking wet all night too. And I was uncontrollably shivering. And then, you know, there's 200 feet straight down below me. And I remember thinking if I fall asleep and lean over, I could fall off this rock and then die just because I fell.
fell asleep for a second. So I literally just tried to keep myself awake all night so I didn't fall off that rock. I never saw Mike again. Like I couldn't, I couldn't see him
He was probably about 50 feet below me, but we could communicate verbally. We didn't have smartphones or Google back then. So I actually think about that a lot. Like if I had my iPhone back then, I would have had the best TikTok videos fucking anybody would have ever had. Exactly. TikTok famous. I mean, you probably wouldn't have had reception, but you definitely, again, if you lived to tell the tale, which you did, have some bomb ass content to post.
What sorts of sounds did you hear in there? We're a big sound podcast. So first I would hear, you could hear the lava flowing. Like, I don't know if you've ever been camping near a river, but you can hear the river flowing at night when it gets real quiet and you're in your tent and you're sleeping. It sounded like that. And then there was like, you know, there were quite a bit of rock slides all around. Like it would, you would just feel this rumble and then you'd hear these rock slides and
And it was a little nerve wracking too, because I'm sitting on a rock and I'm like, what if my rock gives way or a rock above me comes crashing down? So, you know, there was never a moment of like, I could just feel like I'm just going to relax for a minute. Cause it just, I just felt like I was white knuckling the whole time, you know? And then there was this
I don't know if I was hallucinating or what, but there was this bird sound in there. And it sounded like a prehistoric flying dinosaur pterodactyl thing. It was the gnarliest screeching sound. And it went on all night. It had to have been flying around in there because I could hear it coming from different directions. And I kept going, Mike...
are you hearing this thing? It echoed. It was like an echo chamber in there because it's round. And I could never really tell where the rescuers were because the sound would echo around in there when they would yell or whistle. I couldn't tell if they were on my left or if they were on my right or if they were straight ahead or above me. I couldn't tell where they were.
how did you stay calm? Did you take yourself to a happy place? Did you have a mantra? I mean, I wasn't one for meditation back in that part of my life, but I definitely thought about, I had two young sons at the time and I thought about them a lot and I thought about my family. And at some point I did have a conversation with everybody in my family, like,
saying goodbye because I thought for sure this was doom and gloom and there was no way out of this thing. There was no way out. So I spent a lot of time actually talking to my sons a lot in there. Was that the first time you had faced your mortality that way? Oh, for sure. I mean, you know, there was maybe other moments when I was younger, like if you're in a car crash or something that happens, but that's like for a couple seconds. You know, this was hours and hours and hours of
despair. It was torturous. And honestly, I thank God Mike was in there with me because if I was in there by myself, I don't know, man. I mean, it was, the despair was so heavy. I don't know if I could have had the courage to do what I did the next day.
This season, Instacart has your back-to-school. As in, they've got your back-to-school lunch favorites, like snack packs and fresh fruit. And they've got your back-to-school supplies, like backpacks, binders, and pencils. And they've got your back when your kid casually tells you they have a huge school project due tomorrow.
Let's face it, we were all that kid. So first call your parents to say I'm sorry, and then download the Instacart app to get delivery in as fast as 30 minutes all school year long. Get a $0 delivery fee for your first three orders while supplies last. Minimum $10 per order. Additional terms apply. Through the night, there was some whistle communication. Also some potential pterodactyls. Yeah. Maybe. And then when the sun started to come up, put us there in your head. Okay. Okay.
Okay, so that was actually a glorious moment because as soon as I saw First Light, they came out and they were like, okay, we're going to try to work our way around to you guys or get closer and we'll try to throw some ropes down. So that was like, okay, they're going to rescue us now. Mike was all super positive. Okay, Chris, just sit tight. They're going to get us, you know. And sure enough, they started throwing ropes down.
But they never got them close enough that we could actually grab them. And I don't even know how that was going to work anyway. I don't know, man. But anyway, so they threw a rope down and it was about 30 feet away. And I yelled up. I was yelling up, no, you know, more to your right, more to your right. Because they couldn't see you at all. They couldn't see us, right? They were just shooting in the dark, fishing in the dark. Totally fishing in the dark. And I, you know, Mike and I are yelling up, no, more to your right, more to your right, 20 feet to your right.
The rope gets pulled up. About five minutes later, you hear the... And now it's about 10 feet away from us, you know? And I'm like, Mike, can you see it? And Mike's like, I can see it. And I'm like, I can see it too, but I can't reach it. And, you know, it's raining.
The visibility is literally, I can't see. Now the visibility is the worst it's been the whole time. I literally stuck my arm out and I couldn't see my hand in the smoke. But the fourth rope doesn't come down and I'm yelling down to Mike, what's happening? Why aren't they throwing the ropes? And he's like, I don't know, something must be wrong. A couple hours go by and I'm starting to really, I'm starting to freak out now. Like, okay, this is not good.
You know, I'm yelling. No, they're not yelling back. There's no whistle. There's nothing. So I'm like, okay, at four o'clock, at four o'clock, I'm climbing out of here, you know, and I still can't see anything. And Mike's like, don't do it, Chris. He's, he's like begging me not to do it. Don't do it. And so I sit back down. I'm like, fuck, you know, like I can't sit here another night. So then it was the weirdest thing.
It was like suddenly the clouds started to part a little bit. And then this ray of sunlight, this shaft, hits the wall right above me. And I see this clear path. So I go, Mike, now it's almost 430. I yelled to Mike. I said, Mike, the sun broke. I can see this path. I'm going. And I just started to climb. And I climb, climb, climb, climb, climb. And then...
I get to literally where I can see the top, the rim. It's about four feet above me, but there's nothing to grab onto. And meanwhile, I'm three points of contact looking 300 feet straight down. And I'm like, okay, now I'm really fucked because I can't, I don't know if I can get through this last four feet and I can't go back down. There's no way to go back down.
So I just started digging my arms into this gravel. It was this flat gravel. And I dug my right arm in up to my elbow. And then I dug my left arm in up to the elbow. And I just went one, two, three, and I lunged. I don't know physically how I did it, but I flipped my body and landed on my back on the top, right on the lip. And...
I jumped up and I was like, holy shit, fuck. I fucking did it. I'm at the top. And I swear to God, I was the fucking Rocky soundtrack started playing. And I was at the top and I was like, I put my arms up and I was like, I did it. I fucking did it. And I turned and I started to run and there was this huge crack in the side of the backside of the,
the volcano and it was like a cavernous crack and I almost fell into it. Like a crevasse or something, right? It was like a crevasse. And I stopped and I was like, oh my God. And by the way, at the top, the smoke was swirling around. It was raining. It was windy. You know, I couldn't breathe. I was coughing.
And then I saw a rope, the rope that the guys were using. And I started yelling, Mike, Mike, I made it. I made it, Mike. And he couldn't hear me. And I was going to throw the rope down. And then I was like, I'm not going to be able to pull him out. If I throw the rope down to him, he'll probably pull me in and then we'll both die. So I was like, I just laid the rope down right to the edge, like in a straight line. This is where Mike is. At least it's like a pointer to where Mike is.
And so I started walking and about 10 minutes later, I see a helicopter come flying around. And these two park ranger guys looked at me and I started waving my arms and they, they immediately landed on the lava field. And, uh, I remember as soon as the one guy, as soon as he touched my arm, like as soon as he grabbed my arm, my whole body went completely limp. Like I was paralyzed.
And they literally had to, both of them had to pick me up and carry me into the chopper, strap me in. And there's a photo of that, by the way. There's a photo that exists. And that photo of you is...
Dude, you look like you spent the night in a volcano. Yeah. I mean, the joy that I felt at that moment is hard to describe. And I remember the guys were like, it's okay, it's okay. Because I started crying like a baby. Of course. Like I uncontrollably guttural crying. And they were just patting me on the back, just like, it's okay, it's okay, man. It's okay. You're safe. You're fine. Yeah.
And they flew me to the base camp. There are fire trucks and police cars and ambulances and news reporters and news vans. And I see Craig come running over to me and he grabs me and he's helping me walk to, you know, they're taking me to the ambulance. And you thought he was dead. I thought he was dead. And I'm like, oh my God, Craig, you're alive.
He started crying because he was so happy that I, you know, so we're both crying and he's like, is Mike okay? Is Mike okay? And I said, yeah, Mike's still alive. And I put the rope right where he is. So go get him, you know, go get Mike before it gets dark. When you got to the hospital, who did you speak to first out of your family? Actually, my mom was there. My mom, so...
My mom was in LA and she heard the story broke on CNN. A Hollywood film crew crashes, helicopter crashes in the volcano in Hawaii. I mean, it's a headline, isn't it? What a headline. And my mom's like, well, hold on. Chris is in Hawaii. He's working on a movie and they were going to shoot around the volcano. And then literally as she's putting, connecting the dots, the phone rings and
And it's one of the producers at Paramount saying, we have a situation. And she's like, no shit, I'm looking at it on CNN. So they basically said, get on a plane, we'll fly you out right now. She got to the hospital when I got to the hospital. What did she say to you? Coincidentally. I don't remember like a lot of words being spoken. I just remember, you know, she hugged me and, you know, she was crying and I was crying and
I can't imagine when a mom thinks they lost a child, you know, and, and anyway, it was, you know, it was just, it was just an embrace and, you know. Yeah. No, I would be, especially having the potential death of your child televised to the entirety of the world probably at that point. Right. And you're not, you're yourself not even knowing what's happening. Yeah. Do you have any scars, emotional scars that still stick with you? I think about that climb. Yeah.
and how fucking dangerous it was and how lucky I was that I didn't fall. I mean, honestly, I never, ever want to be in a situation like that again, ever. That was, that was hardcore. Like, I don't know if I'd want to wish that upon even my worst enemy. Right. Yeah. That uncertainty for so long. Yeah. Actually, I'm thinking about it now. Um,
for this show, Against the Odds. We're telling your story and you go back and you hear all of the detail and all of the bits and pieces laid out very explicitly because we try to do that. Man, I can't imagine that was honestly very easy.
It's been a little cathartic and it's also, you know, life is always ups and downs and, you know, just the world seems like it's in a bad place. And I think sometimes we just need a regroup. And like this has given me an opportunity to kind of have another mini rebirth by going through this experience again. I mean, I have a lucky tattooed on my arm because of this, you know, and I have a four leaf clover tattooed on my ankle and
I feel like I'm one of the luckiest guys on the planet. And then since then too, I've been married to my wife that I've been married to for 25 years now and we have three beautiful daughters. None of that would have happened if I didn't climb out of that volcano.
Well, my man, Chris, thank you so much for trusting us to tell your story. I'm sure it was thrilling for everybody, all of our listeners, for me especially. And I want to say thank you for joining us on Against the Odds. You're welcome. Thank you for having me. This is the final episode of our series Crash in a Volcano.
I'm your host, Mike Corey. This episode was produced by Pauly Stryker and Peter Arcuni. Our audio engineer is Sergio Enriquez. Our series producers are Matt Almos and Emily Frost. Our managing producer is Tonja Thigpen. Our coordinating producer is Matt Gant. Our senior producer is Andy Herman. Our executive producers are Stephanie Jens and Marshall Louis. For Wondery. Wondery.
I'm Dan Taberski. In 2011, something strange began to happen at the high school in Leroy, New York. I was like at my locker and she came up to me and she was like stuttering super bad. I'm like, stop f***ing around. She's like, I can't. A mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading fast. It's like doubling and tripling and it's all these girls. With a diagnosis, the state tried to keep on the down low. Everybody thought I was holding something back. Well, you were holding something back intentionally. Yeah, yeah, well, yeah.
You know, it's hysteria. It's all in your head. It's not physical. Oh my gosh, you're exaggerating. Is this the largest mass hysteria since The Witches of Salem? Or is it something else entirely? Something's wrong here. Something's not right. Leroy was the new dateline and everyone was trying to solve the murder. A new limited series from Wondery and Pineapple Street Studios. Hysterical.
Follow Hysterical on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of Hysterical early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery+.