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He Survived 3 Days Underwater: The Cook Who Shouldn't Be Alive | True Story : Harrison Okene — Transcript

by I Lived to Tell · 1,175 words · 67 segments · language en · Watch on YouTube

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  1. 0:04he woke up in the dark chest deep in freezing  water alone in the wreckage of a sunken ship 30
  2. 0:11m beneath the ocean's surface around him nothing  but silence twisted steel and death 10 of his crew
  3. 0:19mates were gone there was no light no food just a  small pocket of air and the terrifying knowledge
  4. 0:26that no one was coming this is the story of  Harrison O'Kee a man declared dead a man the
  5. 0:32ocean tried to bury and yet for 3 days he fought  the cold the fear and the crushing pressure of the
  6. 0:38deep until the impossible happened he survived and  against all odds he lived to tell the sea was calm
  7. 0:48in the early hours of May 26th 2013 off the coast  of Nigeria the Jaskan 4 tugboat floated steadily
  8. 0:56in the dark waters of the Atlantic 11 men were on  board assigned to support offshore oil operations
  9. 1:03they had done this many times before there was  nothing unusual that morning below deck the cook
  10. 1:10Harrison O'Ne was already awake he liked to start  early at around 4:30 a.m while most of the crew
  11. 1:17still slept he stepped into the bathroom to get  ready for another day the hallway was quiet the
  12. 1:23only sound was the faint hum of the ship's  generators and then without warning the ship
  13. 1:29jolted violently a massive wave unexpected and  sudden struck the Jaskan 4 broadside the impact
  14. 1:37was catastrophic within seconds the vessel rolled  sharply and capsized flipping completely upside
  15. 1:43down in open sea the lights cut out everything  went black harrison was thrown off balance the
  16. 1:51small bathroom he was in quickly became a death  trap salt water poured in the room turned sideways
  17. 1:58pressure built screams could be heard but only  for a few seconds then they were gone in the
  18. 2:05chaos Harrison made a split-second decision that  saved his life he forced the bathroom door open
  19. 2:11and dove into the flooded hallway swimming  blindly everything was disorienting the ship
  20. 2:17was upside down gravity was meaningless the water  was ice cold and there was no visibility somehow
  21. 2:25guided only by instinct and memory he found his  way into the engineer's office a compartment
  22. 2:30now half flooded completely dark but miraculously  holding a small pocket of air he surfaced gasping
  23. 2:38he had no idea where he was or how long the air  would last he only knew one thing he was alive
  24. 2:45he climbed onto a floating mattress his legs  still submerged in salt water every inch of his
  25. 2:51skin was soaked the air was humid and metallic  it stank of diesel oil and decay he called out
  26. 2:59he screamed into the void he banged on the walls  with pipes metal rods anything he could find but
  27. 3:06there was no response only silence slowly he  began to take in his surroundings he was in a
  28. 3:13space no larger than a walk-in closet flipped  on its side in total darkness the water lapped
  29. 3:19just below his chest the ceiling now the floor  creaked and shifted with every underwater current
  30. 3:26there was no light no phone no radio no way out  as the hours passed the cold became unbearable
  31. 3:35the salt water began to strip the outer layer  of his skin his legs submerged the entire time
  32. 3:41began to swell and blister he had nothing to eat  nothing to drink until he found a single can of
  33. 3:48soda floating nearby his only nourishment for the  next 3 days by nightfall reality began to sink in
  34. 3:56no one was coming he realized that unless someone  knew he was down there he was going to die not
  35. 4:02from drowning but from thirst hypothermia or slow  asphyxiation still he refused to give up he prayed
  36. 4:10over and over he recited Psalm 54 from memory oh  God save me by your name and vindicate me by your
  37. 4:18might on the second day his body began to weaken  he could barely move the cold burned deeper his
  38. 4:25breath became shorter he was inhaling high levels  of carbon dioxide recycled over and over in that
  39. 4:32tight humid space then the hallucinations began  he heard voices some angry some kind he heard
  40. 4:39footsteps above him he imagined someone calling  his name he thought he saw light under the door
  41. 4:46but when he opened his eyes nothing just pitch  black water and the creaking of the ship's remains
  42. 4:53on the third day something changed a sound  different from the rest rhythmic and metallic
  43. 4:59tapping then bubbles was divers but they weren't  there to rescue him they had come to recover
  44. 5:06bodies as the diver scanned the corridor with his  flashlight he entered the engineer's office then
  45. 5:13a hand reached out harrison had positioned himself  at the edge of the air pocket hoping someone might
  46. 5:19pass when he saw the divers's light he plunged  his arm into the water and grabbed him the diver
  47. 5:26jerked back at first he thought it was a dead body  but when the hand gripped tighter he froze this
  48. 5:32wasn't a body was a man alive the diver screamed  "Survivor we have a survivor." What followed was
  49. 5:41a carefully coordinated rescue harrison was fitted  with a diving mask and brought out slowly but he
  50. 5:48couldn't be taken to the surface right away  after nearly 62 hours underwater his blood
  51. 5:54was saturated with nitrogen surfacing too quickly  would kill him he was placed in a decompression
  52. 6:00chamber for over 60 hours more doctors monitored  his vitals constantly when he finally emerged
  53. 6:07he had survived over 5 days between the wreck  and the chamber the world called it a miracle
  54. 6:13but Harrison simply called it grace harrison  O'Kee never returned to the sea after surviving
  55. 6:22something that no one should he left that world  behind the ocean that nearly became his grave
  56. 6:28is now a memory he carries quietly every single  day he still has scars from the saltwater burns
  57. 6:35and sometimes when it rains heavily or the  power goes out at night he says he can feel
  58. 6:40the darkness pressing in again just like it  did 30 m under but Harrison is alive he wakes
  59. 6:47up each morning with gratitude holds his wife a  little closer prays a little longer because he
  60. 6:53knows something most people never will he knows  what it means to be forgotten and found to feel
  61. 6:59death reach for you and slip away to survive  not just by luck but by will this wasn't just
  62. 7:06a story about being trapped underwater it was a  story about holding on when there's nothing left
  63. 7:12to hold about hope when all logic says there  is none this was the story of Harrison O'en
  64. 7:19and against every possible odd he lived to tell  stories like Harrison's remind us that even in
  65. 7:26the darkest coldest places hope can survive if  this story moved you share it with someone who
  66. 7:32needs to hear it and don't forget to like and  subscribe for more real and inspiring stories
  67. 7:38of survival resilience and the strength of the  human spirit thank you for watching [Laughter]

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