Extreme Survivors

Sixty of the world's greatest survival stories. Here is a selection of them:

Survival Stories
• The Miracle of Stairway B, and how 16 people managed to escape death in the Twin Towers on 9/11.
• The infamous story of the Montevideo rugby union team’s plane crash in the Andes, and their subsequent admission of cannibalism – 2012 is the 40th anniversary of the crash.

Prison Escapes
• Mary Queen of Scots and her escape from a remote Scottish castle.
• Three men pull off what is possibly the only successful escape from Alcatraz.
• Henri Charrière’s (Papillon) five escape attempts from the Devil’s Island penal colony.

Wartime Escapes
• The story of Dith Pran, the Cambodian journalist who escaped the genocide of Pol Pot.
• How the German soldier Cornelius Rost escaped from a labour camp in Siberia and trekked for 3 years to Iran.

Shipwrecks
• Ernest Shackleton’s incredible journey to South Georgia to save every man on an expedition.
• The story of 18 year old William Shotton and how he navigated his ship after most of the crew perished from a mystery disease in 1893.

Hostage Situations
• Naheeda Bi’s ten years in captivity after her notorious tribal kidnapping in Pakistan.
• The dramatic rescue of Íngrid Betancourt by Colombian security forces after six years as a hostage.