Terror in the Skies

[0] Today's podcast features three separate wild stories that all involve planes.

[1] The audio from all of these stories has been pulled from our YouTube channel and has been remastered for today's episode.

[2] The links to the original YouTube videos are in the description.

[3] The first story you'll hear is called Unnamed Health Issue, and it's about a man who goes from docile to psychotic in just a few hours.

[4] The second story you'll here is called diuretic, and it's about a last second decision.

[5] that changed the course of history.

[6] And the third and final story you'll hear is called Legendary Lifeguard, and it's about the most famous lifeguard in history.

[7] This one has a very surprising plot twist ending, so make sure you stick around to the end.

[8] But before we get into today's stories, if you're a fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious, delivered in story format, then you've come to the right podcast because that's all we do, and we upload twice a week, once on Monday, and once on Thursday.

[9] So, if that's of interest to you, Please ask the five -star review button to hold your very easily startled cat, and then once they do, press the test button on your smoke detector.

[10] Also, please subscribe to the Mr. Ballin podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts, so you don't miss any of our weekly uploads.

[11] Okay, let's get into our first story called Unnamed Health Issue.

[12] I'm Dan Tversky.

[13] In 2011, something strange began to happen at a high school in upstate New York, a mystery illness, bizarre symptoms, and spreading food.

[14] fast.

[15] What's the answer?

[16] And what do you do if they tell you it's all in your head?

[17] Hysterical.

[18] A new podcast from Wondry and Pineapple Street Studios.

[19] Binge all episodes of hysterical early and ad -free on Wondery Plus.

[20] In 1990, 31 -year -old John O 'Brien was a landscaper in a town just outside of Chicago, Illinois.

[21] In January of that year, he and his friend, David, decided they wanted to escape the cold Chicago winter and go on some vacation to somewhere nice and warm.

[22] And so So they decided to book a trip to the very sunny Caribbean islands of Trinidad and Tobago.

[23] They left for their trip just a couple of days later, which was believed to be January 8th or January 9th, and the hotel they were staying in was right near the airport in Trinidad.

[24] So they land in Trinidad, they get off their plane, they make their way out of the airport, they go to their hotel, they drop their luggage, and then they headed out to explore the town.

[25] And over the next couple of days, they not only explored Trinidad, but also the island of which was a four -hour boat right away, and they had great food, they saw some really cool attractions, and just overall they had a chance to relax in the warm weather while all their friends back home were freezing in Chicago.

[26] And so by all accounts, their vacation was going exactly to plan until Sunday the 14th of January.

[27] This was the day before they were supposed to fly back to Chicago.

[28] That day, John began complaining of some unnamed health issue, which has not been made public so we don't know what it is and he went to some drugstore in town in trinidad to look for a specific medication for this unnamed health issue but the drugstore did not carry this medication so john left and he went to another drug store and another store but nobody had this medication and so by the time john got back to the hotel and saw david david would later remark that john was not only distraught about not having this medication but john was disoriented like whatever this health issue was it was It was starting to manifest itself in this kind of disoriented state that John was in because it was not being treated.

[29] But eventually, David decided that John was okay enough that they did not need to call a hospital or call a doctor, and the two men decided to just go to bed because after all, they had a very early flight the next morning.

[30] So the two men climb into their respective beds, which are in the same room, two twin -sized beds, and they fall asleep.

[31] But about an hour to maybe an hour and a half after David had fallen asleep, he wakes up to some man standing next to his bed choking him.

[32] He's grabbing his throat and throttling him.

[33] And so David has no time to respond to what's going on.

[34] He just starts grabbing this guy's hands and he manages to push them off of him.

[35] And then this guy who's standing next to his bed grabs the lamp next to him and smashes David with it.

[36] David from getting hit falls out of the bed.

[37] He lands on the ground and this guy, his attacker jumps on top of him and the two men are fighting but eventually David manages to overpower this guy and he kicks him off and as soon as he does that he realizes this guy that's been attacking him is John and John is completely naked he's got no clothes on and so John just stands up and David's looking at him like what's going on and John just runs out of the hotel room he ends up running down the hall he goes down the stairs he runs past the front desk out the front doors of the hotel and just takes off running and so John runs for several minutes until he reaches the airport but instead of going through the front gates he goes to the side of the front gates where there are these huge chain link fences with barbed wire at the top and john again wearing no clothes climbs up the chain link fence and then manages to navigate the barbs at the top and drops over onto the other side but where he landed although it was on airport property it was kind of like a trap because this airport had two fences around its perimeter back to back.

[38] And so where John landed was like this grassy no -man's land between these two fences.

[39] But John was on this kind of deranged mission, so he stands up and instead of trying to get back out again, he turns and climbs the next fence, the one that is closer to the airport.

[40] And so he climbs up this fence, he manages to get past all the barbed wire at the top, and he drops into the parking lot on the other side.

[41] He stands up and just continues running towards the main building of the airport.

[42] But between him and the main building of this airport is this huge concrete wall that doesn't look like it has any place to grab onto to climb over it.

[43] But John runs up to this wall and manages to climb up and over the wall.

[44] And where he landed on the other side was right next to this security guard shack.

[45] And so he comes crashing down and the four security guards that are in this shack, they see him come over the wall, they see this naked guy just suddenly appear.

[46] And so they charge out to apprehend him and figure out what's going on, but John apparently attacked them.

[47] We don't know exactly what he did, but he managed to overpower all four of them, and he stole their four -wheel -drive vehicle.

[48] And so John just bombs away from the security guard shack with the four security guards chasing him on foot, and John he weaves around the outside of the main airport building, and he heads out onto the tarmac.

[49] Out on the tarmac, there were several planes that were moving into position for takeoff.

[50] One of those planes was this huge British Airways jet airliner passenger plane that was actually the next to take off.

[51] They'd already fired up their engines and they were sitting at the top of the runway just waiting for clearance.

[52] And John just drives directly into this plane.

[53] But the vehicle he was driving, this little four -wheel drive vehicle, it was not tall enough to actually strike the main body of this plane.

[54] So instead, when he hit this plane, he basically got wedged underneath one of the wings.

[55] At this point, the four security guards that had been attacked and had their vehicle stolen from them, I mean, they're running towards the tarmac, but they've also alerted other security personnel in the airport who are all streaming out onto the tarmac towards this British Airways plane and this vehicle and John.

[56] And so as they are descending on the scene, the security guards would see John from the passenger seat of this four -wheel drive vehicle, he stands up and they can see he's got a pretty nasty cut on his shoulder.

[57] And John reaches up and starts rubbing his hand on the underside of the plane, which had been damaged from running into it.

[58] And there was oil leaking off the underside of this plane.

[59] And John began rubbing this oil around and then dabbing it into his big wound on his shoulder.

[60] And then after packing it with this oil, John leapt out of the wrecked four -wheel drive vehicle and then just took off running away from all these security guards and away from this plane.

[61] And in the chaos of this moment, all these security guards and all the airport personnel that were descending on this scene, they managed to lose sight of John.

[62] He disappeared on the backside of this plane.

[63] And so all these security guards and airport personnel, they come to a stop about 100 feet away from this plane and this wrecked vehicle.

[64] And they're just kind of staring at it, wondering, you know, what are we going to do next?

[65] They're calling other agencies to come in and assist with this situation when all of the sudden somebody notices John about 300 feet away on the other side of the plane, he comes out from behind a building.

[66] And so he's running towards the plane.

[67] He's running towards this wall of security guards and other airport staff.

[68] And John, he manages to get all the way up to the plane before anybody can come up and apprehend him.

[69] And when he reaches the plane, he stops for a second, looks up at the engine of this airplane that's still spinning.

[70] It's been turned on.

[71] And John jumps into the engine.

[72] And instantaneously, John ceases to exist.

[73] He is completely decimated.

[74] No one knows for sure what actually caused John's rampage, although it's assumed it had to do with whatever this unnamed health issue was.

[75] Ultimately, his death was ruled a suicide.

[76] Hey, all you fans of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious.

[77] It's me, Mr. Ballin.

[78] And today, I have some big news.

[79] It's something I'm holding in my hands right now, and so obviously you can't see it.

[80] But this is something you're really going to want to see.

[81] It's the first ever official Mr. Ballin publication.

[82] It's a graphic novel, and it's called Mr. Ballin Presents, Strange, Dark and Mysterious, The Graphic Stories.

[83] It's an anthology of both classic and brand new, terrifying stories that we've never covered on any of my other platforms, because we created them specifically for this first book.

[84] Each of these stories in the book are feature -length Mr. Ballin's stories that really needed to be told visually.

[85] And the artwork in this book is, I mean, I'm looking at it, and it's just absolutely.

[86] stunning.

[87] So the book is not actually coming out until my birthday this year, October 1st, but you can pre -order it right now at book .bollen studios .com.

[88] Again, that's book .bollinstudios .com.

[89] She struck him with her motor vehicle.

[90] She had been under the influence and she left him there.

[91] In January 2022, local woman Karen Reid was implicated in the mysterious death of her boyfriend, Boston police officer John O 'Keefe.

[92] It was alleged that after an innocent night out for drinks with friends, Karen and John got into a lover's quarrel en route to the next location.

[93] What happens next?

[94] Depends on who you ask.

[95] Was it a crime of passion?

[96] If you believe the prosecution, it's because the evidence was so compelling.

[97] This was clearly an intentional act.

[98] And his cause of death was blunt force trauma with hypothermia.

[99] Or a corrupt police cover -up.

[100] If you believe the defense theory, however, this was all a cover -up to prevent one of their own from going down.

[101] Everyone had an opinion.

[102] And after the 10 -week trial, the jury could not come to a unanimous decision.

[103] To end in a mistrial, it's just a confirmation of just how complicated this case is.

[104] Law and crime presents the most in -depth analysis to date of the sensational case in Karen.

[105] You can listen to Karen exclusively with Wondery Plus.

[106] Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcast, or Spotify.

[107] Our next story is called diuretic.

[108] On April 17th, 2018, 42 -year -old Holly Mackie sat down in aisle's seat 14C on a Southwest Airlines plane.

[109] That morning, she, along with 143 other passengers and the five crew members, would be flying from New York City to Dallas, Texas.

[110] And then after that four -hour flight, Holly would get off that plane and board another plane from Dallas to Oklahoma City where she lived.

[111] But luckily, that flight was only about an hour long.

[112] After Holly buckled her lap belt, she put her carry -on bag under the seat in front of her, and then she waited to see who was going to be sitting in the two seats to her left.

[113] A few seconds later, a 43 -year -old bank executive and mother of two named Jennifer Reardon came walking down the aisle and stopped right outside of row 14 and turned into the aisle towards Holly.

[114] And Holly, who was kind of keeping her head down, she noticed there was this person standing outside of her aisle, And so she turned and looked up, and looking down at her was this big, bright smile.

[115] And Jennifer said to her, hey, you know, can I sit next to you?

[116] Is anybody using those seats?

[117] And Holly would say, nope, I'm here by myself.

[118] Go right ahead.

[119] Unlike other airlines that would assign seats to all of their passengers before they boarded, Southwest Airlines has an open seating plan.

[120] What they do is they basically group passengers into boarding groups, but then once that group is on the plane, it's first come first surf.

[121] After Jennifer slid past Holly and made her way to the window seat where she sat down, which was seat 14A, she buckled her lap belt, and then just like Holly, she took her carry -on bag and stuffed it under the seat in front of her, and then she pulled a paperback book out of her bag and started reading it.

[122] For the next few minutes, as more and more passengers came onto the plane, nobody took the seat between Holly and Jennifer, because generally speaking, people don't like riding in the middle seat if there is a window or aisle seat available, because it's just not very comfortable sitting between two people for hours at a time.

[123] But eventually, the only seats left were middle seats.

[124] And at some point, this pre -teen girl who had her head buried in her phone, she comes onto the plane and she works her way down and she stops outside of row 14 and she very politely asked Holly if she can sit between her and Jennifer.

[125] And Holly says, absolutely.

[126] And so this girl slips past Holly and she sits down in seat 14B.

[127] She puts her lap belt on, she takes her carry on, puts it under the seat in front of her, and then she just goes back to looking at her phone.

[128] Now that all of Holly's seatmates had arrived and she would not need to be getting out of the way for more people to come into a row, Holly kind of relaxed for a minute and she pulled out her iPad and she began scanning through the news as she waited for the plane to finish boarding.

[129] After all the passengers had been seated, one of the flight attendants closed the airplane door and then they grabbed the microphone and welcomed everyone aboard the plane and thanked them for choosing Southwest Airlines and then they reminded everyone on board to make sure they're seated.

[130] seatbelt was fastened, that their tray was in the upright position, that their seat was upright as well, that they'd stowed big electronics, and then with the help of several other flight attendants, they went over some basic safety procedures in case of a mid -air emergency.

[131] Most of the passengers on this flight were really not paying attention to the safety brief.

[132] They were trying to sleep, or they were stowing their stuff, or they were sending one last text message.

[133] But Holly, on the other hand, she was paying careful attention.

[134] Now, this wasn't totally unusual for her.

[135] She was generally safety conscious, but for some reason on this flight, she just had a sense that something bad was about to happen.

[136] There was this deep sense of foreboding that she normally didn't feel on flights.

[137] And so she found herself really carefully paying attention to these procedures in case something did go wrong.

[138] After the brief was over, the attendant who was holding the microphone thanked everyone for listening and then said, sit back, relax, and enjoy your flight.

[139] But Holly couldn't do that, because one, she really did have this weird sense that something was off about this flight, that something bad was going to happen, and she just didn't know why.

[140] And then number two, she remembered that she had drank this huge cup of iced coffee before she boarded the plane, and so now she really had to use the bathroom.

[141] But the plane had already begun taxiing over to the runway, and an attendant had told her she had to sit down.

[142] You can't go to the bathroom now.

[143] You've got to wait until we're up in the air.

[144] And so Holly, who is now feeling very mentally and physically uncomfortable, found herself kind of anxiously looking to her left out the window as the plane continued to taxi to the top of the runway.

[145] And then once the plane was set, it paused for a second, and then the engines fired, and Holly and the girl next to her and Jennifer all got sucked back into their seat as the plane began hurtling down the track.

[146] And so Holly, the girl, and Jennifer, they're all turned.

[147] They're looking out the window as the plane is just bombing straight ahead.

[148] They're watching the airport kind of disappear on a view.

[149] And then they feel the plane begin to get lift and then they take off.

[150] As the plane rapidly ascended, Holly turned away from the window and just sat back and closed her eyes and was just picturing that moment when they reached their cruising altitude and she would hear that chime in the cabin and then the captain would come on the intercom and say we've reached our cruising altitude it's now safe to get up and walk around at which point holly was going to run to the bathroom and so when the plane finally got to a point where holly felt like they were starting to level out they probably were going to be at their cruising altitude soon holly preemptively undid her seatbelt and turned to face the aisle getting ready for that chime in the cabin so she could get to the bathroom as soon as possible.

[151] But that chime didn't happen.

[152] Instead, when they reached their cruising altitude, the captain came on the intercom and she would tell everyone that they had reached their cruising altitude, but no one can leave their seats yet.

[153] They were expecting some fairly rough air, some turbulence.

[154] And so Holly was totally frustrated and disappointed, and she let out this audible grunt out of frustration.

[155] And Jennifer, who had her head in her book, she hears this grunt, and she turns to look at Holly to make sure she's okay and at the exact same time Holly found herself kind of looking down and turning towards the window to look out the window and she made eye contact with Jennifer and immediately Holly recognized that Jennifer thought something was wrong with her and she was kind of looking at her to make sure she was okay and Holly just goes I really have to go to the bathroom and so at this the two women kind of laughed about Holly's plight because it was kind of funny that she desperately needed to go but wasn't allowed to and so eventually Jennifer just said you know I'm sure they'll let you go soon, and then Jennifer went back to her book, and Holly went back to anxiously waiting to use the bathroom, and the girl sitting between them did not care at all.

[156] She was not listening to them.

[157] She didn't care.

[158] She had her head buried in her phone.

[159] After several minutes, Holly started to worry that it might be a while before she was allowed to get up and move around, because she's looking at the flight attendants and they're all buckled into their jump seats, and they were hitting some turbulence, and so Holly's thinking, okay, I got to do something to take my mind off of this discomfort.

[160] Not only the physical discomfort of needing to use the bathroom, but also that strange foreboding, it just was not going away.

[161] And she didn't know what it was, but she just had the sense that something bad was going to happen.

[162] And so Holly decided she would do some work.

[163] And so at 11 .04 a .m. Eastern, she reached down below the seat in front of her and began fishing around in her bag for her laptop.

[164] Before she could grab it, she heard two deafeningly loud sounds in rapid succession.

[165] The first was a popping sound that came from outside of the plane near the left wing, and the left wing was right outside of their window.

[166] And then she heard this whooshing sound that went through the entire cabin.

[167] It was like a high -powered vacuum.

[168] And then the entire cabin became freezing cold as the plane banked hard to the left.

[169] After all this happened, in this fraction of a second, Holly sat up, and it was like she was immediately in shock.

[170] She's looking out across the other seats, and she sees all those oxygen masks have deployed from the ceiling.

[171] People are screaming, the attendants are running up and down the aisle, trying to help people put their masks on as the plane is hard banking to the left.

[172] And Holly just kind of robotically reaches out and grabs the mask right in front of her.

[173] And she tries to put it on, but despite having listened intently to the safety brief, it was like her hands didn't work.

[174] And she couldn't get the band to extend long enough to put it over her head.

[175] And so she's fumbling with this mask still in shock.

[176] She can't believe this is actually happening.

[177] This is how she's going to die.

[178] And then it's like she snaps out of it.

[179] And she forgets about the mask and she turns left to make sure the girl and Jennifer were okay.

[180] And what she saw was absolutely horrifying.

[181] That popping sound she heard outside of the plane was the sound of the engine underneath the left wing exploding.

[182] And when it detonated the cowling, which is the outside of the engine, kind of protects the engine, it broke apart.

[183] And one of the pieces of this cowling flew and hit the side of the aircraft, and it struck the window of Row 14, Holly's Row.

[184] And when it did that, it shattered the window completely, causing an explosive decompression of the cabin.

[185] When even a small hole opens up in a plane flying miles above the earth, that hole will create hurricane -like forces inside of the cabin.

[186] And so anything that is not completely anchored down, including people, will get sucked.

[187] out of that hole.

[188] And in this case, that's what happened.

[189] When that window broke open, Jennifer, who was sitting closest to it, was immediately sucked through the window.

[190] Now, she was not completely ejected because her seatbelt kept her from going completely out the window, but her entire upper half was now wedged outside of the plane.

[191] As for the girl sitting next to Jennifer in between Jennifer and Holly, she was still getting pulled towards the window because Jennifer, even though she had been pulled out, there was still segments of the window that were open.

[192] And so there was still suction towards the window.

[193] And so Holly instinctively reached over and grabbed this girl and pulled her in tight to her chest.

[194] And then with her left arm, she reached behind the girl and grabbed the belt of Jennifer.

[195] And she tried to pull Jennifer back into the plane, but she could tell there was no way she could pull her back.

[196] The forces pulling Jennifer out of the plane were far too strong.

[197] Holly remembers thinking, someone is going to know this is happening.

[198] There's got to be a sensor or something.

[199] The flight crew has got to be aware that a person is getting pulled out of the plane.

[200] But in reality, the captain and the flight crew, they were aware that the left engine had blown up.

[201] That was the thing they were actively trying to combat to try to keep the plane from crashing, but they had no idea about the drama that was unfolding in row 14.

[202] And so Holly is holding on to Jennifer.

[203] She's holding onto this girl and she's screaming out for anybody in the plane to please take notice of the fact that Jennifer is stuck out of the plane.

[204] But the sound that was being created by this open window was deafening.

[205] Nobody could hear anybody else in this plane.

[206] Not to mention, the plane is banking hard to the left and everybody on board believes they're about to die.

[207] So no one is looking around taking stock of what's going on and assessing what to do next.

[208] Everybody's in survival mode and is basically just focused on themselves.

[209] And so despite Holly yelling out and trying to wave to people, it was worthless.

[210] Jennifer was just stuck out the window and no help was coming.

[211] And so for several minutes, Holly is just holding on to Jennifer, she's holding on to this girl, she's screaming out for help, but no one's hearing her.

[212] And then eventually as the plane began to come back from its bank and it seemed like the pilot was taking control of the craft, even though it was deafening inside and it was still terrifying.

[213] People began to open up their blinders a little bit and they started to look around and some people sitting in the vicinity of row 14, they noticed what was going on with Jennifer and they began yelling and waving for the flight attendants.

[214] But again, the sound from this window was deafening.

[215] There was just no way the attendants could hear them.

[216] And even though everyone's waving at the attendants, the attendants are very preoccupied.

[217] They're dealing with the people right in front of them who are all very worried and concerned.

[218] They're trying to talk to the captain about what they need to next and so they did not see there was this emergency happening and so for several more minutes Jennifer is just stuck out the window with nobody helping her and it was during this time as Holly is holding on to her waist and she's holding on to the girl that Holly is thinking you know Jennifer she's been stuck outside the plane where there's no oxygen for almost 10 minutes nobody can survive that and Jennifer has been forced through this window that's not big enough to have a person fit through it.

[219] And so Holly found herself moving her left hand that was gripping on to Jennifer's waist.

[220] She just let go of it, not because she was trying to let go of Jennifer.

[221] Frankly, her hand was not keeping Jennifer from going anywhere.

[222] It was just kind of habitual that she was holding on to her waist.

[223] So she takes her hand off of her waist and she just places it right in the center of Jennifer's back.

[224] Like she was comforting Jennifer.

[225] She was showing Jennifer that you're not alone.

[226] We can't help you, but you're not alone.

[227] And the woman in row 15, an older woman, she saw Holly do this, and she reached across and she put her hand on Holly's back.

[228] It was like everybody knew this is a total crisis, but there's just nothing we can do, even if it's killing Jennifer.

[229] Despite the damage to the left engine from it exploding, the captain, Tammy Joe Shultz, who was a longtime veteran of the airline, she was able to combat this hard bank to the left, and she regained control of the plane, at which point, through the intercom, she was able to bark out orders that were loud enough for the flight attack.

[230] to actually hear what was going on, and they were instructed to get up and walk down the aisles and make sure the passengers are okay.

[231] And this is when the crew spotted Jennifer.

[232] They acted quickly and rushed over and they grabbed Holly and the girl next to her, and they safely got them out of that row and moved them to a different row.

[233] And then once they were gone, two men named Andrew and Tim, they volunteered to go in row 14 and pull Jennifer back into the plane.

[234] They knew the risks.

[235] They is still an opening in this plane and they could very easily just get sucked out themselves.

[236] But they didn't care.

[237] They knew they needed to help this woman.

[238] And so without any hesitation, the two men walked into row 14.

[239] They got in position.

[240] And with all their might, they were able to pull Jennifer in.

[241] They got her into the aisle.

[242] And then the two men were able to leave row 14 without being sucked out.

[243] And so Jennifer is laying in the aisle and a passenger who happened to be nurse, who was named Peggy, she rushed over and she began performing CPR.

[244] At this point, Holly remembers looking around the cabin and seeing that everybody was just perfectly still.

[245] It was still deafeningly loud inside of the cabin because this window is still sucking air out, so it's very, very loud, but she's looking out and there was just this aura of calm inside the plane.

[246] No one was running around.

[247] No one was panicking.

[248] Everyone was just kind of sitting watching as Peggy was trying to save Jennifer's life.

[249] At 11 .21 a .m., so 17 minutes after that pop was heard outside of the plane, the captain of this plane is able to successfully perform an emergency landing at an airport in Philadelphia.

[250] And as soon as they touched down on the runway, the captain had already coordinated with a medical team who was standing by, and they rushed on, they grabbed Jennifer, they rushed her out, they got her to the hospital, but unfortunately she didn't make it.

[251] She died from blunt force trauma from having been forced out of that window.

[252] It was just too small, and it happened too suddenly, and it killed her.

[253] Holly was obviously very shaken up by this experience, just like the rest of the passengers who were on board.

[254] But there's a detail in Holly's story that makes her experience even more traumatic.

[255] On the morning, she got on this plane.

[256] She arrived at the airport fairly early.

[257] She had a big coffee with her, and she got in line for security.

[258] So as she's going through this line, she's drinking this huge coffee.

[259] And then when it's her turn to actually go through the scanners, She finishes this coffee, she throws it away, she goes through security, and by the time she's on the other side, she's now late.

[260] And so she runs all the way to her gate, and when she boards, her boarding group has already gotten on.

[261] And so all the seats that she liked to take, those are already gone.

[262] She liked to sit towards the front of the plane because she liked to be one of the people that got off the plane first once they landed.

[263] And so she began looking for the first open row that she could sit in.

[264] And so she starts walking down the row, and she finally gets to row 14.

[265] She's looking on her left and there's a totally open row, three open seats.

[266] And so, like she always did on long flights, she took the window seat, seat 14A, because she could lean her head up against the side of the plane and sleep.

[267] And so after she buckled herself in and put her luggage underneath the seat in front of her, she remembered she had just drank that huge cup of coffee while she was going through security.

[268] And even though she didn't have to go to the bathroom right then, she expected to probably have to go a couple of times once they took off.

[269] And so not wanting to disrupt the two people that were inevitably going to take the two seats next to her by constantly all flight long getting up and sneaking past them to go to the bathroom over and over again, Holly decides, you know what, I'll just move, I will sit in the aisle seat.

[270] It's not as good because I can't sleep.

[271] But at least this way, I can get up and use the bathroom without disrupting the people I'm sitting there.

[272] And so she unbuckles herself, she reaches down, she grabs her bag from underneath the chair in front of her, she stands up and she moves two seats over to the aisle seat of row 14.

[273] She sits down, she puts her seatbelt on, she puts her luggage under the seat in front over there, and then as she's kind of getting herself situated, she sees someone has stopped right outside of row 14.

[274] And so she turns and looking down at her is the smiling face of Jennifer Reardon.

[275] And she says, hi, you know, is anybody sitting next to you?

[276] Can I sit next to you?

[277] And Holly says, absolutely.

[278] And Jennifer sneaks past her and sits in the window seat.

[279] The next and final story of today's episode is called Legendary Lifeguard.

[280] On June 25th, 1950, the Korean War broke out between the North Koreans and the South Koreans.

[281] Just two days after this war had begun, the United States formally entered the conflict by sending troops to aid the South Koreans.

[282] Shortly after this, the United States enacted a military draft.

[283] A military draft is the forced enlistment of civilians into the military.

[284] In the Korean War, the way Americans were chosen was in a lottery, and if their name was called, they would have to stop whatever they were doing in the civilian world and immediately go serve their country.

[285] And if they refused, they would go to jail.

[286] An 18 -year -old high school dropout, nicknamed Samson, was living with his family in Seattle, Washington when he found out he had been drafted.

[287] While military service was not something Samson was considering for his future, he accepted his fate with grace, and before long, he was making his way to Fort Ord in northern California to begin his military training.

[288] But after training, when Samson was now officially a soldier in the army, he was not sent to Korea to fight in the war.

[289] Instead, he was ordered to stay at Fort Ord and be the lifeguard for their pool.

[290] It's unclear how Samson felt about this, but regardless, he did his duty, and he stayed at this pool and he minded the folks who went swimming, and then at night and on the weekends, he would earn some extra cash by being a bouncer at a local bar.

[291] A year later, Samson was still working at the Fort Ord Pool when he decided to take some time off and go back home to Seattle and see his family and see his girlfriend.

[292] As a military member, Samson was able to fly for free on any military flight so long as he was in uniform.

[293] And so Samson packed up his things, he threw on his uniform and he made his way over to the Fort Ord Airport where he hopped on a small military plane and he flew to Seattle.

[294] A few days later, on September 30th, 1951, Samson said goodbye to his family and to his girlfriend.

[295] girlfriend, and then he put his uniform back on and made his way to the Seattle airport.

[296] When he got there, he saw there was only one military plane that was flying from Seattle all the way down to Fort Ord, and this plane was a World War II -era dive bomber that only had enough space for one person, the pilot.

[297] Samson had to get back to Fort Ord that night because the following day he had work and in the army you can't just not show up for work.

[298] But Samson didn't have enough money to buy a civilian plane ticket to take a a civilian flight down to Fort Orr.

[299] So he was in a tough spot.

[300] And so he approaches this pilot of this dive bomber plane.

[301] Then he says, hey, you know, can I just cram into your radar compartment in the back of your plane?

[302] And the pilot, whose name was Anderson, immediately said, no, that's a terrible idea.

[303] It's not meant for passengers.

[304] It's barely big enough to fit inside of.

[305] You could get badly hurt in there.

[306] But Samson was adamant that he had to get back that night, that he'd be in so much trouble if he didn't.

[307] And he kind of appealed to Anderson and said, look, you're in the military, you get it, I have to get back there tonight.

[308] Can you please make an exception and just let me hitch a ride in the back of your plane?

[309] And so finally, against his better judgment, Anderson caves, and he says, okay, Samson, you can come with me. And so a little bit before 4 p .m. that afternoon, Samson eagerly went around to the side of the plane.

[310] He opened up a side hatch, and he crawled inside of this very tight radar compartment.

[311] And once he was tucked up inside, Anderson walked around and he closed the hatch behind him, and then Anderson got in the cockpit and began preparing the plane for takeoff.

[312] A few minutes later, the pair was careening down the runway and right as the plane began to experience lift and was going up into the air, the side hatch of the radar compartment where Samson was suddenly flew open.

[313] The big issue with this now open door in the radar compartment was not that Samson, like in the movies, would get sucked out this door out to his death, although if he wasn't careful, he totally could fall out of the door.

[314] No, the real problem with this now open door had to do with oxygen levels.

[315] At their cruising altitude where the majority of their flight would be spent, there wasn't enough oxygen in the air to sustain human life.

[316] And so as soon as Anderson powered up that plane and began preparing it for takeoff, he began pumping oxygen into the cockpit and also into the radar compartment space.

[317] This is done specifically to compensate for the lack of oxygen up at that cruising altitude.

[318] But with Samson's door now wide open, all that extra oxygen that was coming into that space to keep him alive is now just being sucked right out the door into the atmosphere, which meant if Samson couldn't find a way to shut that door, he would eventually pass out and suffocate to death.

[319] Samson, who was fully aware of this fact, immediately jumped into action by anchoring his feet and legs around the stanchion in the middle of this compartment space.

[320] And once he was fairly secure, he began extending his upper body out of the plane to try to grab onto the handle to try to shut it.

[321] But once he was holding onto that door handle, he's now halfway out of the plane.

[322] He could not get it to shut.

[323] The wind was so strong it was pinning the door open.

[324] And so for the next several minutes, Samson desperately is trying to get this door shut, but it's not working.

[325] and so eventually he retreated back into the plane and went all the way to the very back of the radar compartment space and tucked himself up behind some equipment.

[326] Because this was not an area where passengers were supposed to be, there was no way to communicate with the pilot.

[327] He could not tell Anderson that he was dying back here.

[328] And so he just sat there and prayed.

[329] While Samson was dealing with this open -door crisis, Anderson was dealing with a crisis of his own.

[330] At some point, after takeoff, he looked down at his gauges, and he realized a terrible mistake had been made.

[331] There wasn't enough fuel to get to Fort Ord and where he was discovering it, where he was out over the water, there wasn't enough fuel to even turn around and go back to Seattle.

[332] And so Anderson grabs his radio and he tries to call out to these surrounding airports to see if there's anywhere he can just emergency land this plane, but all he hears is silence.

[333] It would turn out his radio equipment just happened to fail right at this moment.

[334] And what also happened to fail right at that moment was Anderson's oxygen supply.

[335] It had nothing to do with Samson and the open door.

[336] Anderson just also suddenly was without oxygen.

[337] And so Anderson knew he had to get to a lower altitude as fast as possible because he would eventually pass out and crash the plane.

[338] And so he went into a very steep dive and began going down and realized he needed to try to land this plane in the ocean now.

[339] There was no way he could get to an airport.

[340] And so he's burning down towards the water, and as they're coming down in altitude, there was more oxygen in the air.

[341] And so Samson, who had eventually passed out from a lack of oxygen, is suddenly revived with all this additional oxygen as they're going down.

[342] And so Samson comes to and he looks and the door is still wide open, and all he can see is the Pacific Ocean burning up at him.

[343] He only had a few seconds to grab on to the stanchion in the middle of the space he's in before they impacted the water.

[344] Miraculously, Sampson survived the impact, but immediately he was faced with another life and death situation.

[345] Because this door was wide open, the freezing cold water began pouring inside flooding the space.

[346] And so Sampson tried to swim his way out, but the power of this water coming in was too strong, and so he had to wait until the space completely flooded before he swam out and then swim up to the surface.

[347] Once he got to the surface, he's looking around and the water's incredibly choppy, and it's very foggy.

[348] He can barely see anything.

[349] He's looking around for Anderson, not really sure what happened to him, and he looks down the plane towards the front of the plane, and he sees Anderson climbing out of the cockpit.

[350] He looks badly beaten up, but he's alive, he's okay.

[351] And so Samson yells to him and the two men link up, and they're able to pull two life rafts out of the plane.

[352] And so both men that get into each of their wraps right as this plane sinks down below the surface.

[353] And so Anderson and Samson begin looking around, wondering what they're going to do, but it's so foggy, they can't see land in any direction.

[354] They can barely see 10 feet away from themselves.

[355] And so Anderson thought they landed maybe two or three miles off the coast of California, but they weren't really sure.

[356] So Anderson pulled out his compass, he looked east and said, let's just start paddling.

[357] The men had crashed about two miles off the coast of Point Reyes, California, which is this big protected shoreline that's about 150 miles north of Fort Ord. And this particular stretch of water that these two men had found themselves in was a known breeding ground for Great White Sharks.

[358] So the two men, they got their compass and they're trying to swim as fast as they can to the east, but they're not seeing any land, the fog hasn't let up at all, and then eventually it got dark.

[359] And as soon as it got dark, the water got choppier and choppier until at one point, Samson actually was launched out of his raft into the water.

[360] He turned around and saw his raft, but it was being pulled away by a current faster than he could swim to it.

[361] And so Samson yells out for Anderson, who sees him in the water.

[362] Anderson tries his best to paddle over and save Samson.

[363] But the current was too strong, and before long, Samson watched as Anderson just disappeared into the fog.

[364] Now, Samson was all alone in the middle of the night.

[365] He couldn't see anything.

[366] There's no land anywhere.

[367] He doesn't have the compass.

[368] Anderson had the compass, so he has no idea which direction is what.

[369] He's in a shark breeding ground, and now he doesn't have his life raft.

[370] And so Samson did the only thing he could do, which was pick a direction that he believed was east and start swimming.

[371] And so Samson is swimming in this pitch black water.

[372] He can't see anything around him.

[373] And all he's probably thinking about is how any minute now, I'm going to run out of energy and I'm going to sink down and I'm going to drown or I'm going to get attacked by sharks or some combination of the two.

[374] But miraculously, after about an hour of swimming in some direction, he broke through the fog and he saw way off in the distance was a light on what looked like dry land.

[375] And so he has this sudden burst of energy and he swims as hard and as fast as he possibly can.

[376] A couple of times he gets pulled under by rip currents and he nearly drowns, but eventually he gets to the sandy shores of Point Reyes.

[377] It's believed he swam approximately one or two miles after being dumped out of the boat.

[378] As he was pulling himself out of the water and collapsed on the beach, he had given everything to that swim.

[379] Had he been in the water for even a few more minutes, it's very likely he would have drowned.

[380] Unable to stand from pure exhaustion, Samson just began slowly crawling up the beach towards this light he had seen as he was swimming and it would turn out this light was on the outside of this building that was owned by a radio station and so samson is crawling and periodically puking out seawater and finally after about 30 or 45 minutes he gets to the steps of this building he crawls up the steps and he pounds on the door and by this point he's hypothermic he's in shock he's about to die if he doesn't get any help and luckily there's someone inside of this building.

[381] They open it up.

[382] They see Samson.

[383] They don't know what's going on, but they pick them up, they pull them inside, they wrap him in a blanket, and they try to ask him, you know, what happened?

[384] What's going on?

[385] Why are you here?

[386] But Samson was too cold to even speak.

[387] So we just sat there and shook.

[388] And so finally, this employee just called the Coast Guard that had a station very close to where they were.

[389] And a few minutes later, the Coast Guard shows up.

[390] They take Samson and they rush him to their station house where they were able to give him medical treatment, which saved his life.

[391] It was also at this Coast Guard station where Samson was reunited with Anderson, who had also managed to make his way to shore alive.

[392] Samson would go on to serve for two more years in the army.

[393] The entire time was spent as a lifeguard at the Fort Ord Pool.

[394] Then in 1953, after the Korean War ended, Samson's mandatory service came to an end, and he was honorably discharged.

[395] Samson would go on to become one of the most successful and well -known actors and producers of all time.

[396] He has won hundreds of big awards, including four Academy Awards and four Golden Globe Awards.

[397] Samson's real name is Clint Eastwood.

[398] Thank you for listening to the Mr. Ballin Podcast.

[399] If you got something out of this episode and you haven't done this already, please ask the five -star review button to hold your very easily startled cat, and then once they do, press the test button on your smoke detector.

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