Speaker 1: I Heeart podcasts.
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Speaker 1: Hey, this is.
Speaker 3: The Christian O'Connell Show podcast.
Speaker 2: All right, before we get into the rest of today's show,
Speaker 2: this is the only story, the only thing that we
Speaker 2: should be talking about today. And trust me, the moment
Speaker 2: you hear this story about a young Australian called Austin
Speaker 2: appleby an incredible name and an incredible young man, this
Speaker 2: is heroic story, the lights of which I've never heard
Speaker 2: before from someone who's thirteen. If this was a grown up,
Speaker 2: it would still be extraordinary, but the fact it's a
Speaker 2: young kid who's thirteen. I'll just play the news story
Speaker 2: and then we can talk about this. But I earn
Speaker 2: you right now, whatever you're doing, and I know you're busy,
Speaker 2: right now, stop what you are doing actually and just
Speaker 2: turn this story up. It is incredible and no matter
Speaker 2: what you've got going on in your life right now,
Speaker 2: this just does it retunes you to the awe and
Speaker 2: wonder of what people can do. But this is a
Speaker 2: young kid. He's a thirteen year old Australian. I've listened
Speaker 2: to this.
Speaker 3: A brave thirteen year old boy is being praised for
Speaker 3: saving his family from an ocean ordeal. He swam for hours,
Speaker 3: then ran for kilometers to raise the alarm after they
Speaker 3: were swept out to.
Speaker 4: Sea, barely visible against the fury of the sea. This
Speaker 4: is where a thirteen year old boy made a near
Speaker 4: impossible decision to leave his family in order to save them.
Speaker 5: I was really scared.
Speaker 6: I was just thinking in my head, don't thinking I
Speaker 6: was going to make it.
Speaker 4: Through stranded four kilometers off the coast in Wa Southwest
Speaker 4: for more than eight hours after rough seas swept them
Speaker 4: out while kayaking on Friday, Austin app will be braved
Speaker 4: fading light and dangerous waves for four hours to get
Speaker 4: back to shore. His mum, twelve year old brother, and
Speaker 4: eighty year old sister could only wait.
Speaker 6: I just said, all right, not today, not today, not today.
Speaker 6: I had to keep on going.
Speaker 4: As the sun began to disappear, so did his mum's hope.
Speaker 5: My fear was that awsome nicking. Everything goes through your
Speaker 5: head as one.
Speaker 4: But incredibly the teen did, running another two kilometers to
Speaker 4: call for help.
Speaker 6: I thought they were dead. I had a lot of
Speaker 6: guilt in my heart because you know, I thought, oh man,
Speaker 6: I wasn't fast enough.
Speaker 4: Two hours later they were spotted clinging to a paddle board.
Speaker 4: The whole family brought home safe.
Speaker 5: Speech ass efforts at the same time I knew he
Speaker 5: could do it.
Speaker 1: Anyone else has got goosebumps.
Speaker 2: Yes, like a Spielberg movie, but this is real life
Speaker 2: and it's a thirteen year old kid. There's so many
Speaker 2: moments to actually just pause and reflect on, really, because
Speaker 2: the story's got about five incredible moments in it. First
Speaker 2: of all, the mum making a decision. I can't even
Speaker 2: imagine as apparent what that would be like to send
Speaker 2: one of your kids out into well, you've got no
Speaker 2: you don't.
Speaker 1: Know whether they're going to make it the open seats,
Speaker 1: so you don't know if you're.
Speaker 2: Ever going to see them again, or if they're going
Speaker 2: to survive. You know, you're already worrying that actually they're
Speaker 2: probably not gonna make it and what that means.
Speaker 1: Then you've got your other children there.
Speaker 2: You've got so much going on your own survival, their survival,
Speaker 2: his survival. But she makes an incredible decision to actually,
Speaker 2: ultimately that actually saved the entire family's life. But then
Speaker 2: this young, tiny, little thirteen year old lad swims for hours.
Speaker 2: I speak of someone who is who's winded doing a
Speaker 2: lap of a poll. I can't imagine swimming for hours
Speaker 2: in the ocean. And then he has the presence of mine.
Speaker 2: He tries to tow his family himself back towards the shore.
Speaker 2: He really knows he can't do that, and he has
Speaker 2: to carry on without them and let them go and
Speaker 2: still carry on swimming. Then he realizes and has the
Speaker 2: incredible presence of mine and self leadership. He takes off
Speaker 2: his life chat it because it's obviously impeding his swimming process.
Speaker 2: Then he swims into a void for four ko and
Speaker 2: off two and a half miles, and then there's a
Speaker 2: clear weather interviewing him and it's Paul adds and no
Speaker 2: one crutches obviously because of the exhaustion physically and mentally
Speaker 2: that he must be going through. Because it happened Friday,
Speaker 2: he said that what actually kept him going was their
Speaker 2: family of faith, was that he was he was praying
Speaker 2: and thinking, he would only himself think happy thoughts, happy thoughts,
Speaker 2: which is just it almost brings tears, she wies. I
Speaker 2: think that he knew that that's what he needed to
Speaker 2: do to keep going, and then then he'd has to run,
Speaker 2: so can I two kate to ring for help and
Speaker 2: then very calmly, apparently the saying that he asked for
Speaker 2: helicopters and boats to try and find his family.
Speaker 1: And this is his mum talking as well.
Speaker 7: The decision was either if I can roll back to
Speaker 7: shore to get help quickly, or I could leave to
Speaker 7: kit a tea. So him in the oldest and the strongest,
Speaker 7: we said, we said, and he was quite happy going,
Speaker 7: which was a very hard decision because you don't want
Speaker 7: to see any your kids have to do that.
Speaker 1: That is I never heard a story like it, guys.
Speaker 8: It's remarkable. And they said it's the equivalent of running
Speaker 8: two marathons. And when you think about how far four
Speaker 8: kilometers is, it's eighty laps of a fifty meter pool. Now,
Speaker 8: I can't do more than you know, five ten laps
Speaker 8: of a fifty meter pool without stopping multiple times. He
Speaker 8: did this without a life jacket.
Speaker 9: In the rough seas you are, you're all so terrified
Speaker 9: that you are going to die and that you're never
Speaker 9: going to see your brothers and sisters and your maum
Speaker 9: ever again, he has to.
Speaker 1: Be with all of those thoughts.
Speaker 2: And if you've ever just gone for a little swim
Speaker 2: in the ocean, you shouldn't. It takes a long time
Speaker 2: to make any prograst. It does, you don't appreciate you
Speaker 2: watch it on TV. You see the Olympians doing it
Speaker 2: very quickly, you do it yourself. I'm mean in this
Speaker 2: for a minute, I'm barely moving.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: And also that part of Australia, those are not safe waters. No, No,
Speaker 2: there's a couple of times where he said he swore,
Speaker 2: he swore he saw.
Speaker 1: Things sticking out where he's still just had to go.
Speaker 1: That is I don't know if it goes beyond heroism.
Speaker 1: I don't even know what to say. That story is.
Speaker 8: Yeah, you can barely believe it's true, and yet it's so.
Speaker 8: It's one of the most inspiring things I've ever heard,
Speaker 8: Like it just changes your whole perspective.
Speaker 10: A lot of sharks signings there too, in a lot
Speaker 10: of sharks, especially between Dunsborough and Bustleton where this happened.
Speaker 10: Beautiful part of the world, but very sharky. So to
Speaker 10: be able to swim through that four kas knowing that
Speaker 10: there's a lot of Sharks about wow Wie.
Speaker 1: Yeah, his name is Austin Appleby.
Speaker 2: I urged you to take the time today to go
Speaker 2: and watch the interview as well. It's an amazing story.
Speaker 2: They should do Young Australians of the Year if they
Speaker 2: don't already, because that kid is a true Australian of
Speaker 2: the Year.
Speaker 5: Christian O'Connell Shark Gone Podcast