Stories of amazing survivals

[Miss Chicken]

I have been following the story of the Chilean miners and when a book comes out about it I plan to read it. I really like stories about amazing survivals.

Among the books I have read are

Alive, Miracle of the Andes and Survive which are all about the Andes Survivors

Hijacked: The Real Story of the Heroes of Flight 705

The Man Who Refused to Die which is about Cook Islander Teehu Makimare and six other men who drifted for 2000 miles in a small boat (not all survived)

The book about the girl who was the sole survivor of a crash in the Amazon jungle

I have seen the DVD of Touching the Void but have not yet read the book.

Can anyone recommend other good true life survival stories/books. Even if there hasn't been a book written about a survival story I will still be interested to hear about it.

 

[Winged Victory]

I've always been amazed as well to hear about true survival stories. I was going to recommend Touching the Void, but I see you've got it on your list!

I would check out Sir Ernest Shackleton, and his voyage to the Antarctic on the Endurance. It's an incredible story. Here's the blurb about it on wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_Trans-Antarctic_Expedition

I highly recommend the miniseries starring Kenneth Branagh called Shackleton, which chronicles the lengths he went to saving his crew from death.

 

[Mr. B]

That reminds me, I still have the movie Alive waiting on my DVR.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

The Mount Everest disaster. May, 1996.

In fact the whole thing happened right in the middle of filming an IMAX movie on the mountain - the camera crew put down their gear and assisted in the rescue.

 

[RJDiogenes]

The story of the Apollo 13 crew is pretty amazing.

 

[Yeoman Randi]

^ I have to agree, that's the first thing that came to my mind.

 

[RobertVA]

A very long book title:
A Narrative Of The Mutiny, On Board His Majesty's Ship Bounty; And The Subsequent Voyage Of Part Of The Crew, In The Ship's Boat

Author: William Bligh

Froma Wikipedia article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Bligh : "The mutineers provided Bligh and the eighteen of his crew who remained loyal with a 23 foot (7m) launch (so heavily loaded that the gunwales were only a few inches above the water), with four cutlasses and food and water for a few days" "Thus, he undertook the seemingly impossible 3,618 nautical mile (6,701 km) voyage to Timor. "

http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/20337

The page indicates you can download the ebook for free.

For a different viewpoint on the mutiny: Mutiny on the Bounty (novel)

Authors: Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Nordhoff
As I recall, Nordhoff and Hall also wrote novels about the ordeal on the launch, the mutineer's experiences after the mutiny and the confinement and return of the crewmen that the mutineers left in Tahiti to England for trial.

 

[melancholymecha]

the title escapes me but there's a movie coming out with James Franco about the guy who fell down a cave shaft & had to cut off his arm that got trapped under a boulder. I think its based on a book he wrote about his experience.

 

[Candlelight]

The Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition is the greatest survival story ever. Not only did the harrowing adventure last two and a half years but Shackleton saved everyone in his crew. Truly inspirational. The 100th anniversary is coming up soon. Hopefully we'll get a big budget film (I found the Kenneth Branagh miniseries a little lacking). The Imax documentary however was truly mind blowing.

Apollo 13 is quite amazing too.

 

[RJDiogenes]

^ I have to agree, that's the first thing that came to my mind.

And the movie is very good.

 

[Sky]

The Mount Everest disaster. May, 1996.

In fact the whole thing happened right in the middle of filming an IMAX movie on the mountain - the camera crew put down their gear and assisted in the rescue.

And there are plenty of books about the disaster. The best one is probably Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air.

 

[Michael_C]

My friend Kilong Ung escaped the Khmer Rouge concentration camps in Cambodia as a teenager, with some (not all, sadly) of his family. He published the book "Golden Leaf" last year, and has been using the money from to start a foundation and is building a school back in Cambodia. He lives in Portland, OR today with his wife and kids. Tremendously positive and optimistic guy, despite the horrible things he endured in the camps and while escaping. It's available on Amazon here.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

And there are plenty of books about the disaster. The best one is probably Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air.

Which Anatoli Boukreev felt the need to rebut, and in the process, act like a total dick.

 

[Sky]

And there are plenty of books about the disaster. The best one is probably Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air.

Which Anatoli Boukreev felt the need to rebut, and in the process, act like a total dick.

True that. Still, Boukreev's book was better than Beck Weathers' Left for Dead.

 

[M'Sharak]

Can anyone recommend other good true life survival stories/books. Even if there hasn't been a book written about a survival story I will still be interested to hear about it.

Years ago, I remember reading The Raft, by Robert Trumbull, which tells of three downed Navy aviators during WWII who survived thirty-four days adrift in the Pacific in a small raft.

Edit:

Here's a news account of another survival story I read years ago, this one dating from 1866 and bearing the byline of a reporter who would later become quite well-known. He just happened to be in the right place and time to interview the rescued sailors who had been floating in an open boat for forty-three days after their ship caught fire and sank:

http://www.twainquotes.com/18660719u.html

 

[RJDiogenes]

My friend Kilong Ung escaped the Khmer Rouge concentration camps in Cambodia as a teenager, with some (not all, sadly) of his family. He published the book "Golden Leaf" last year, and has been using the money from to start a foundation and is building a school back in Cambodia. He lives in Portland, OR today with his wife and kids. Tremendously positive and optimistic guy, despite the horrible things he endured in the camps and while escaping. It's available on Amazon here.

One of the Midwives I used to work with was one of the "boat people" who escaped from Vietnam. She was just a kid. Didn't speak a word of English and had no support. Her family froze their first winter here because they didn't know about turning up the thermostat. A few years later she was not only fluent in English but held several degrees and was a practicing CNM. A very good one, too.

 

[Roger Wilco]

Just found this coincidentally.