Episode 5 Close Calls: On Camera

A close call.

A moment of danger when life can hang in the balance.

A split second where the outcome could go either way.

I was rooted to the spot with fear.

The difference between disaster and survival.

Our hearts dropped. This was a big crash.

These are the people that have been there and lived to tell the tale.

Need an ambulance.

15 minutes and your number would be up.

Their instincts and resources,

coupled with the quick thinking of others, helped to pull them through.

It could have gone wrong. It could have easily gone wrong.

And their dramatic experiences were recorded on camera.

I think there were several things that could've killed me,

should've killed me and didn't.

It's a day they'll never forget.

The day they had a close call.

Today on Close Calls...

a British student is lost in the Turkish mountains with two friends.

A day's hike becomes a week-long battle for survival.

This is where we have been sleeping for the last four days.

Trapped in the path of a faulty firework, an eight-year-old girl

tries to escape as a rocket heads into a trampoline.

SCREAMING

And an attempt on a speed record goes horribly wrong.

The car hurtles into the air as the driver's family watch on.

The car could have been a mangled wreck.

Richard could have been dead, he could have been thrown out.

We just didn't know it.

Antalya in southern Turkey.

British student David Mackie

and two friends are lost in hostile, mountainous terrain.

They've left an easy-mark trail and ended up on a short-cut to danger.

After five days and nights in the wilderness, a massive

land and air search is launched, but to the despair of David's

parents, there is no sign of their missing son or his pals.

It was getting dark, we were getting cold, and all we can think of

is the kids out there, they are going to be a lot colder than us.

Awful thoughts go into your mind sometimes.

21-year-old David Mackie lives at home with his parents in Nottingham.

He's close to his mum, dad and sister,

and they often spend family holidays together.

But he's excited to be heading off to Turkey

to study aerospace engineering.

I really love travelling, and I thought Turkey looked interesting

cos there is a lot of differences culturally,

religiously and things like that.

So I thought it would be a good opportunity to not just go there

on holiday, but to live there and experience it for real.

Like a lot of kids at that sort of age,

he's inquisitive about what's going on in the world around us.

'But he's not got a massive amount of experience.'

And it's during this time, away from his family,

David embarks on an adventure they'd all rather forget.

It's January. David and his two friends Marije and Frisko

travel from Istanbul to Antalya,

for a short hiking trip. David uses a mini camera to record the trek.

They've decided to walk along a popular tourist trail called

the Lycian Way, which follows the coast from Antalya to Oludeniz.

David's told his parents of his plans and promised to phone them

as soon as he gets back to campus. On day one, Sunday,

they begin an 11-mile walk along the well-marked path,

but they start out much later than intended.

We were all in quite good spirits.

It was really quite a sunny, hot, nice day.

It was a really nice hiking route as well,

really nice views and things like that.

They're enjoying the terrain so much,

they begin to lose track of time.

Once it started to get dark, we did start to panic a bit.

We did see a town that looked, at the time, quite close,

so we thought, we'll take a short cut, go off the path,

and go to this town that does not look too far away.

The town was next to an ocean, we found a dry riverbed,

so we figured we'd follow the dry riverbed down,

we'd get to the ocean, we'd get to the town.

As nightfall closes in, David realises it could be a mistake.

They are struggling over unmarked rocky ground,

grounded only by their helmet torches.

This is no short cut to safety.

The youngsters keep going, but the town does not materialise.

The light has played tricks on them.

They have no choice but to sleep out in the open.

We were just planning on a day hike, so we really had no equipment,

we had no tents, not any proper equipment to light a fire.

They have no food either.

They've eaten all the snacks they brought with them earlier,

while they chatted their way along the trail.

Then we thought it was quite funny that we had to sleep

outside for night because we were thinking,

the next day we'll get to the village anyway.

At the moment, it seems like a bit of an adventure.

But it's January,

and overnight temperatures in the region can drop below freezing.

Monday morning dawns, and David records their makeshift camp.

He's confident that by the end of the day they'll be safe,

and enjoying a joke about getting lost on a simple tourist trail.

So the friends continue on their short cut,

following the riverbed, scrambling over rocks,

until they drop to a level where the river is filled with water.

It's this simple decision to stick to their short cut

and not return to the marked path that will later prove their undoing.

It leads them deeper into a ravine.

Suddenly they realise there is great danger ahead.

It eventually got to a point where it was just a sheer drop waterfall,

so there was no way we could get past.

Their way forward is blocked.

The mini camera records Marije desperately searching

for some way to get down the waterfall.

The boys are willing her to find a route to safety.

If they can't get down, they will have to turn back,

which would mean at least one more night in the open.

With the way forward completely impassable,

David and his pals are fast running out of options.

That was the first time I really started to panic

because I thought, OK, we cannot go here, then where should we go now?

We were all wet and it was very cold the first night, so we started

to panic a bit, and that's when we started trying to make

emergency telephone calls.

But in the depths of the canyon,

the students can't get a signal on their mobile phones.

The priority is to try and get a phone signal by climbing higher.

We tried to walk around the valley and tried to get to a high point to

either get a signal or see some sort of town

that we could walk to that night, but no luck.

And then the situation gets worse.

A storm hits the mountains.

David and his friends face another night in the open.

They seek shelter in a cave on the other side of the river,

aware that no-one even knows that they are lost.

The next morning we were all wet and very hungry as well by now,

and we wanted to carry on walking back, but the riverbed

that we walked across before was really flooded incredibly heavily.

It was running very fast.

There was no way the three of us could cross it.

They were forced to stay out the raging storm for two more days

and nights - tired, hungry

and with the growing realisation they are in big trouble.

At that point, Marije was quite low

and we didn't see any realistic end in sight.

It's day five before the storm abates.

The river subsides

and David makes another recording on his video diary.

This is where we have been sleeping for the last four days.

The trio know if they are to get help using their mobile phones,

they must reach higher ground.

David is anxious, but trying to remain confident.

Today we're making our way back up the mountain,

and tomorrow we will be back home.

But back at his family home in Nottingham, 2,500 miles away,

his parents, Christopher and Alison, and sister Hannah,

are experiencing their own emotions.

A growing feeling of fear.

His family expected him to phone on Wednesday night to say

he was back in his college rooms. When he doesn't, they're surprised.

He would normally get in touch with us to let us

know that everything is OK,

but obviously the next day we kept trying to send messages,

and getting nothing back at all.

When they still haven't heard anything by Friday,

they are concerned.

Enough to start calling the local Turkish authorities.

They reported back some good and bad news at lunchtime,

to say that the good news is there has been nobody reported

injured or in trouble with the police,

but the bad news was that they haven't contacted them,

they haven't found anything at all.

With still no word from David's party,

they are declared officially missing.

His now frantic parents book a flight to Turkey.

Later, Turkish authorities launch a search and rescue operation,

scouring 25 square miles of mountains.

And David's parents' fears grow

when there is still no trace of their missing son.

Also coming up, at speeds reaching 90mph,

an amateur racing driver comes off the track.

Just somersaulted and flipped way up in the air and disappeared from view.

Middlesbrough, Teesside.

Captured on the security cameras of a family home,

a group of adults and children gather

for a garden firework display.

But it goes dangerously wrong.

An out-of-control rocket screams into an enclosed trampoline,

where two of the children are playing.

I panicked.

I thought it was going to hit my face and make me blind.

Her dad fears the worst.

Could have been severe burns.

Kacey!

November 5th, Bonfire Night.

The annual tradition for Peter Watson's family is a visit

to a local display, then back home for their own fireworks.

Went up to Stockton to watch a nice big display.

Came back and decided

we were going to set a few fireworks off ourselves.

Peter's eight-year-old daughter Kacey is looking forward to it.

We were going to all have fireworks and just celebrate Bonfire Night.

Peter has a variety of security cameras on the outside of his house.

They show 14 of his family

and friends gathering in the front garden.

Aware of the dangers of fireworks, he's launching them from the green,

40 feet away, while Casey joins one of her friends on the trampoline.

I was excited to see what my dad had bought

with his money on the fireworks.

We said the safest place for the children to stay is

in the garden, keep the gate shut, or preferably, in the trampoline.

It's more enclosed, if anything did go wrong.

Up to this point, the night has been going well.

Me and David were setting them up,

and we had taken one out of the sealed box,

taken it over to the sandbox,

put them in there and letting them off one at a time.

Never had any concerns with safety.

As long as they're all marked up for British use, it should be OK.

It's just, fireworks are fireworks, they are a dangerous item,

and can go wrong at any time.

And one is about to, badly.

The group wait eagerly for the last firework of the night.

Over on the green, out of sight of the CCTV cameras,

Peter lights the touch paper on the final rocket,

and immediately knows there is a problem.

Literally, as we lit it, it started to move,

and I shouted to the kids, "It's going in that direction! Run!"

Peter can see the firework will set off towards the house.

His panicked warning can be heard on the security cameras.

Some of the children realise the danger, and run.

But the rest of the group don't realise what's happening.

The rocket is about to fly into the family's home above,

deflect off a bedroom window,

and then shoot down into the area where most of the children are.

The security cameras pick up the sight and sound

of the terror that follows.

SCREAMING AND YELLING

The rocket has flown into the trampoline.

Young Kacey and her friend are trapped inside by the netting.

The rocket bounces off the base, straight for Kacey.

She cannot get out of the way, and it hits her.

Terrified, she rips at the netting.

She breaks through, but her foot is caught.

She falls onto the ground, gets up in a panic and runs into the house.

Peter watches on with horror.

I ran over to the children

at the same time as it hit the home and landed.

"Help." It was just "help" going through my mind at the time.

I was very scared for the kids.

I was fearing the worst, there could have been severe burns.

Peter searches frantically for his daughter.

-Kacey! Where's Kacey?

-In the house.

Kacey!

Kacey has run upstairs. She's in shock.

My friend knew it was coming, and then it didn't hit my friend

because she stepped aside.

I could see loads of sparkles going up,

and then it just goes "bang!"

and goes all the way round the trampoline.

And it, like, hit off my leg.

I panicked. I just panicked.

I never panicked before in my life.

I thought it was going to hit my face and make me blind. I just jumped.

I broke the net.

Thankfully, despite being hit by the rocket,

Kacey is completely unharmed.

I feel lucky that it hit my leg but I wasn't hurt.

Unbelievably, nobody in the firework's flight path was injured.

The kids were very, very lucky that nobody was burnt,

not even a spark hit any part of her skin.

Not even a burn on clothing.

Somebody must have been watching down on us that evening,

for what happened.

Worcester, in the West Midlands.

Amateur racing driver Richard Price is trying to set a new course record

in his Caterham sports car.

But the on-board camera is about to capture the moment

when something goes horribly wrong.

Richard has hit the bank at over 90mph.

His terrified family are watching on.

It just somersaulted and flipped way up in the air

and disappeared from view.

The car could have been a mangled wreck,

Richard could have been dead, thrown out, we just didn't know.

The moment 54-year-old Richard Price got behind the wheel

of a sports car, a love affair began.

My wife and I sat in a Caterham probably about 1987,

something like that, and said to ourselves,

"We'll have one of these one of these days."

But it wasn't for another 14 years, when finally, in 2001,

Richard bought himself a Caterham kit,

and built himself the car of his dreams.

I really enjoyed the process of putting the car together,

and was quite disappointed when I had finished building it.

To drive it was fabulous. But the more you drive it,

the better it gets.

Richard got so addicted to his beloved car that he began

racing it in hill climbs - timed runs up a steep, winding track.

And it turns out he's pretty good.

Yes, I've been competing since 2002,

and have won the class in the club championship three times now.

But today Richard needs to hit speeds of over 90mph

if he is to beat the course record at this racetrack in Worcester.

I'd been slightly quicker than the class record in practice,

I knew there was a little more to come, and I felt confident.

And Richard has brought along his own group of supporters.

His sister-in-law, Pat Barnsley, and her husband, Brian.

We got a really good viewpoint about halfway up,

just coming out of quite a steep what would be left-hand bend.

And when it comes to his first run of the competition,

with his on-board camera rolling, he's ready to smash that record.

I had really good traction away from the start. My first corner went OK.

Maybe I was carrying a little bit more speed than

I had done, but I kept the throttle nailed.

Maybe a little too much.

Thundering around the corner at over 90mph,

the rear of the car starts to slide.

Richard's car goes flying off the track.

The camera cuts out,

but the car continues to hurtle down the steep bank.

It somersaulted and flipped way up in the air,

and disappeared from view.

Pat and Brian are praying that Richard is going to reappear

over the brow of the hill.

I was just hoping against anything that he wasn't hurt.

We just couldn't see.

The car could have been a mangled wreck, Richard could have been dead,

he could have been thrown out, we just didn't know.

Richard has ended up upside-down in a ditch in his mangled car.

But he survived and remembers every moment.

I was up and over the bank in a flash, I remember the nose digging in

and the heavy impact, and I remember the car bouncing several times.

And I'm thinking, "Oh, it's stopped, I'm OK."

Race officials and doctors sprint over to try and find him.

I thought the most likely thing was they would need help to get

a stretcher back up the bank,

having recovered him in whatever condition he was in.

I certainly never expected to see him walking up the bank.

I've never been so glad to see him in my life, to be honest.

Richard knows he's been saved by the racing harness

and roll cage he built into the car.

But things could have been so much worse.

If it had landed a few feet one way or the other, then there were

tree stumps in the undergrowth, it could have been quite nasty.

After taking a nine-month break from the sport,

Richard has rebuilt his beloved car and is back at the races.

Yes, I have been competing, and, yes, I do compete hard, still.

And I'm still looking for those tenths of a second.

These days, we all rely on mobile phones,

and in an emergency they are a godsend.

However, in a remote location you can't always get a signal.

But back in Turkey with our lost students,

they discovered you should never give up.

David Mackie and two friends are six days into a terrifying ordeal.

An easy day's hike along a popular tourist trail in the Turkish

mountains has gone disastrously wrong.

The trio left the path to take what they thought was a short cut.

Now, they are lost, hungry and frightened.

David's frantic family have alerted the Turkish authorities

from their home in Nottingham.

The bad news was that they haven't contacted,

they haven't found anything at all.

Up in the mountains, David and his pals are desperately trying to find

their way back to the safety of the marked trail, via a dry riverbed.

We didn't know which river

that we followed down. Because of the rain,

there were new rivers, and none of the rivers looked the same any more.

They are surviving by drinking from mountain streams.

David doesn't know that his worried parents have contacted

the Turkish authorities.

He keeps checking his phone and suddenly, on day six,

he gets a signal.

Just as I tried to turn my phone off, Marije, who was with me, noticed

I got two bars as I pressed "power off".

David dials 911, the emergency number in Turkey, and for

the first time in almost a week,

he makes contact with the outside world.

Sadly the women couldn't speak particularly good English,

so it could be a bit frustrating, trying to explain where we are.

We are worrying at that point whether all three of us

would make it through the night.

The trio head for an opening in the ancient woodland,

in the hope that rescuers spot them from the air.

Emergency services in Turkey notified David's anxious parents

that their son is alive and has made contact.

They were quite confident they'd located them,

so we were absolutely delighted.

His parents take the first available flight to Turkey.

In the mountains, the three friends cling to the hope that rescue

is imminent, but their ordeal is far from over.

We got to a big, wide-open area, waited for three or four hours,

didn't hear anything, didn't see any lights.

They have no choice but to sit tight and keep a lookout.

But, as the sun sets on day six of their wilderness ordeal,

close to despair,

the young friends can only huddle together for warmth and support.

The next day, day seven, David attempts another 911 call,

and learns a helicopter is on standby.

I managed to say, "How long will it take?"

They said about 20 minutes, so we thought,

they've got our co-ordinates, they'll be here in 20 minutes.

At that point my phone died, I had no battery left.

They came and told us where they were looking and they took

dogs out and they were very confident that they would find them.

Waited and waited for hours and hours, no sign,

we couldn't hear any helicopter.

Seven rescue teams and more than 100 people

are now scouring a 25-mile area along the trail.

We got to about two-ish, and you could see the search teams

and the police were getting more despondent.

We were getting cold, it was getting dark,

and all we can think of is the kids are out there,

they are going to be a lot colder than us, and you start to get

concerned that they knew where they were but they haven't found them.

On the morning of day eight, frustrated

and close to giving up, David repeatedly

tries his phone in a bid to guide the search teams to their position.

I decided to check my phone again,

I warmed it up a bit for the battery,

and miraculously had 3% power left.

I don't not how, because it had already died.

I managed to make an emergency call.

He gets through,

and later that day their hopes are raised by a welcome sight.

We could see the helicopters flying by.

A helicopter flew really close to us one time.

But it doesn't see them.

It's now Sunday night, and a week since they set out.

Davis, Marije and Frisko spend their eighth night in the open.

Next morning, in a final desperate attempt to be spotted,

they climb out onto an almost-sheer cliff face.

It works.

This infrared image is from the helicopter rescue's on-board camera.

Unbelievable mix of emotions cos it's what you've been

dreaming of for seven days, and it finally actually happened.

But the biggest emotion was relief more than anything.

And news of the sighting quickly travels back to

David's parents at their hotel.

We got a message to say they had found them,

they had actually located them, and we just couldn't believe it.

We actually saw a photograph taken on somebody's phone,

so when we saw them, that was absolutely unbelievable.

Hovering dangerously close to the sheer cliffs where David

and his friends are clinging to the rock face,

the rescue helicopter crew film

as the winchman snatches them to safety.

We didn't really speak very much, to be honest with you.

It was just very overwhelming for all three of us, really.

Really just thanking anybody that had done anything

to find us because we were

in very desperate need for help at that point.

After a short flight back to Antalya,

they are greeted by a swarm of international media.

For the first time in nine days, David and his friends feel safe.

But through the crowds, David is only looking for two people.

'During the eight days, the one thing I thought about the most

'was my parents and times I had spent with my parents,'

so I was in very desperate need to see my parents.

So when I got off the helicopter, to see them running towards me

was an unbelievable moment.

'Oh... Unbelievable. Unreal.'

Absolutely unbelievable, after all that time to get

him in our arms, it was absolutely fantastic.

Absolutely wonderful.

'I think we just expressed how much we loved each other.'

There wasn't a great deal else to be said. It was so simple.

That's all. And so pleased to see him.

David and his friends are taken to hospital

and checked over for dehydration and hypothermia.

But the only treatment they need is food, water and a comfortable bed.

David and his friends had set out on an easy day's hike.

Instead, they endured an eight-day fight for survival,

which ended 18 miles away, on this sheer mountainside.

The main mistake was going off the path.

That was the ultimate mistake, to be honest.

That led us into that situation.

It could have gone the wrong way.

It could have easily gone the wrong way. But thankfully it didn't.

That's all for now.

Join us next time for more tales of survival,

from people who have had a close call.