‘Survivor’s’ Ozzy Lusth Almost Died In an Off-Camera Incident

“Survivor” fan-favorite Ozzy Lusth recently revealed a harrowing story about one of his seasons where he thought he was going to die. Read on to find out what happened on “Cook Islands” and what he would change about “Survivor” nowadays if he could.

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Lusth Swam Out Too Far and Almost Didn’t Make It Back

In an interview with “Entertainment Weekly,” Lusth described an incident right before the merge during “Cook Islands” where he decided to try to cross the barrier reef near their beach and get out into the real ocean — and it was nearly a fatal decision.

He explained how their island was protected from these huge waves by the coral reef and one day, the swell had dropped down enough that he thought he could try to get outside of the reef. He let production know what he was doing and even though “they tried their hardest to talk [him] out of it,” he “wasn’t going to listen to anyone who wasn’t Jeff [Probst] or Mark [Burnett].”

“Once I made it out into the deep, I was blown away. I realized immediately I was in a potentially dangerous situation,” Lusth recalled, adding, “I was on the edge of very, very deep water. I could see the floor just falling away like I was sitting on the peak of a mountain. The massive fish, sharks, and the inky cobalt blue of the deep rattled me and it hit me just how insane I was and how dangerous things could be. If something happened to me, there was nobody gonna come save me … still gives me chills thinking about that.”

So he turned and started to go back to shore, but “getting in was much harder and more dangerous” than he had anticipated.

“I was able to keep my feet under me as the wave dragged me across the reef, chewing up the bottoms of my sneakers. I barely escaped my journey to the deep and thus made my way into the final stretch of the game. That experience was transcendental and gave me a newfound appreciation for the wilds of nature and my own inner strength,” said the four-time “Survivor” player.

It is kind of surprising that the show didn’t find a way to include that. Lusth was a popular player who made it very far in the game, so that might have been a really neat thing to include — except for the fact that they probably didn’t have much footage of it, because Lusth said that the camera crew only followed him out so far.

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Lusth Wishes ‘Survivor’ Was As Diverse as the ‘Cook Islands’ Season

The “Cook Island” season is the famous season where the show cast four equal tribes of four races — white, Black, Latinx, and Asian. Lusth said he would love to see that kind of diversity on the show again.

“I think ‘Cook Islands’ was the most diverse cast yet, and I’d love to see much more inclusion and representation of all the different types of people that melt into our culture. Not just different ethnic backgrounds, but all different walks of life, and lifestyle. The more visibility on TV, the better we will all be as a whole. In this divisive time in our history, tolerance and diversity are our greatest strength,” said Lusth.

He may get his wish with CBS’ new pledge of more inclusion and diversity. And the leaked “Survivor” season 41 cast so far looks to be very diverse.

“Survivor” is back in production now. If the pattern holds, it should be premiering its 41st season the third or fourth week of September 2021.

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