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tv   2020  ABC  August 26, 2014 10:00pm-11:01pm PDT

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[ laughter ] captions by vitac -- if you think your vacation was a nightmare, wait until you see these. vacations from hell. >> three, two, one! >> first, we're checking in at the caribbean, where you want the sun and blue sky over your head, but what you get is landing gear. >> nice quiet day at the beach. >> and the tropical breezes are more like turbo currents blown away. before you even get there, what can go wrong? >> you should assume that this bag is going to be handled in the worst day. >> your luggage, lost, found, stolen and worse. >> then here comes the really gross part, the dirty panties. >> so you found someone else's
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underwear in your bag? >> yes. >> dirty laundry. and then, who's sitting next to you on the plane? from sexed up to taped up. all stars to amateurs, who gets your vote for passenger from hell. >> some people just aren't good in normal life and then they get in a plane. >> buckle up. does anything compare to landing in the wrong country. >> we're going to spain. he said spain, what are you talking about? we're in the west indys. >> tonight vacations from hell. >> summertime fun, for many of us it's about getting on a plane and landing in paradise. but for others, it can be a one-way ticket to hell that can start at the airport as soon as you check your bags. >> i think i realized something was wrong when i saw the line forming, and then it really sank in when the security guard started coming in. >> just a few weeks ago nora low
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of san diego was among thousands of british airways passengers flying out of london's heathrow airport, only to find when she landed there was a computer glitch and her luggage was missing. >> horrible. for four days british airways didn't ship any luggage. they told me about 40,000 bags had been misplaced. >> did she say 40,000 bags? nora was flying from a two-week business business in amsterdam to her brother's place in lake tahoe. >> it completely ruined my vacation. i had about $4,000 worth of clothing in it. not only did their customer service stop taking phone calls, their voice mail filled up and they weren't allowing you to leave a message. >> she says days go by with no answers, so nora wages her own war against the airlines. her ammunition? tweets. >> i just started tweeting. that's when i started to realize that there was other people that were tweeting the same, and we formed a little army and just kept retweeting. >> did it work?
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we'll see. last october, megan mccord, an atlanta jewelry designer had a similar hellish experience when she said she packed about $6,000 of her precious jewels in the suitcase she checked. >> were you nervous about the idea of checking your bag with jewelry in it? >> i thought it will be okay. i can't carry all this stuff. >> at the baggage carousel, anxiety. >> waiting and waiting and this bag never showed. >> megan was flabbergasted. but that doesn't surprise this guy. he's a professional baggage handler. >> what's one of the biggest misconceptions about how our bags are handled. >> that we care. >> in his book, the american made baggage handler, he unloads the dark side of his profession. >> you should assume that this bag is going to be handled in the worst way. >> watch. this rampie likes the pushover technique.
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>> a lot of these folks have been standing there for quite a while. what's going on back there? >> they're in no rush. as they deliver the bags to the claim, the bags fall out of the cart onto the ground. >> bags rolling like tumble weeds. think life can be better in the front of the plane? think again. in fact, that first class priority tag might even make your suitcase more attractive to a sticky fingered handler. >> what does a baggage handler look into a bag? i imagine there are cameras around the airport. >> they find places that are not monitored. >> like these guys caught in the belly of a plane in jfk. this one goes through a wallet and snags cash. this one snags headphones. >> as long as they got that bag in an area that's unmonitored, unsupervised, they can do what they want. >> megan knows that for sure. her missing bag finally arrived in her atlanta home 23 days later with, she says, an
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unwelcome surprise. >> let's put gloves on. >> why rubber gloves in wait and see. >> did you recognize any of these things. >> these are my jeans but they're turned. >> somebody had worn these. >> yes. then i find shoes two sizes two big. then here comes the really gross part. dirty panties. >> you found someone else's underwear in the bag? >> yes. preworn. then comes the jewelry bag. so i open it up and i was just devastated. >> so they took all of your july r -- jewelry except for these pieces. >> yes. >> somebody got rid of your stuff, swapped it out for their own? >> yes. it felt violating. >> in one of the busiest airports in the u.s., los angeles police recently caught baggage handlers red-handed. chief patrick gannon headed the sting operation. >> the pictures here that you see are the items that were recovered during the search
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warrant. >> and what did they steal out of those bags? cell phones, ipads, expensive jewelry, cartier sunglasses and $1,000 cameras. >> i do think that the temptation is great. but when you take into consideration 460 theft reports and last year with 67 million passengers, that's really not a lot of theft. >> so how bad is it? here some hard numbers. according to the u.s. department of transportation, more than 99% of checked luggage actually arrives unscathed. last year alone there were almost 170,000 reports of mishandled bags in the u.s. that includes damage, delay, lost and theft. so what's a weary traveler to do to help ensure your luggage arrives safely? first, buy a four wheeler. >> when we load a plane, if it doesn't have the wheels, they will throw it, kick it, toss it. with four wheels they can just roll the bag. >> next, find a bag as strong as
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a tank. what is this made of? >> this is the same material that the nfl used for their shoulder pads and race cars. if it does not have zippers, immediately people who steal luggage, it gives them less options. >> believe it or not, experts say don't check in too early. just 60 to 90 minutes before takeoff can help prevent your luggage from being tossed and lost. and if you're really paranoid about keeping track of your bag, technology to the rescue. for 90 bucks you can get a tracking device like track dot. i packed it on a recent trip to l.a. just after landing, ta-da, i got an alert on my phone. my suitcase was in l.a., too. the joyce of reuniting with your bag. now back to our unlucky traveler, nora, and her twitter war with british airways. it's been nearly two months and still no luggage. >> i've tweeted about this and
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gotten people to pay attention. >> guess who spots nora's tweets. we did. that seems to have done the trick. >> about an hour later i got a call from british airways saying that they were going to help me with my claim. >> we reached out to british airways who declined to talk on camera but did tell us this. we're very sorry that ms. low's luggage was misplaced but on the rare occasion we are unable to find a bag, we will make sure that a customer is compensated. well, nora still doesn't have her bag. but just recently she finally got a check from british airways. $1750 plus a $500 bonus as a good will gesture, about half of what she says her back is worth. >> travel nightmare, lesson learned the hard way. i'm never going to check a bag ever again. next -- okay you're finally on the plane, but are you traveling with the passengers from hell?
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we're talking about a volatile mixture of crowds, delays, security, fear of flying, screaming babies, and a bucket load of liquor and anything can happen. check out this guy back in june shouting at his family on a jet blue flight, attacking flight attendan attendants. listen to his daughter pleading. she must be so proud. he was handcuffed to his seat. >> it's nerve racking. it seems to be happening more and more. >> what about this? a pair of tipsy mums taking a
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security check too seriously. and then there's this. sweet seniors falling in with the wrong crowd en route to cabo. funnyman hal sparks has seen it all. >> some people just aren't good in normal life, and then they get in a plane and they don't understand how it stays in the air. they're claustrophobic, a agoraphobic and they come together on a plane. >> i'm the punching bag. >> she says it's a potential powder keg. >> you have a half a millimeter and there's 160 passengers in a flying tube at 30,000 feet. >> mary schiavo, a former inspector for the department of transportation. >> alcohol and aviation do not mix. >> she's now a lawyer who defends passengers accused of being unruly. >> look at that. >> she's talking, you know,
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kristen wiig on "bridesmaids". >> ready to parrtaaayyy! >> earlier this month a dallas to boston flight diverted to nashville after a female passenger not kristen wiig actually ran towards the cockpit and attacked the flight attendants. there were 8,000 reports of disruptive passengers last year alone. for our unscientific of the worst, let's start with the naughty nakeds. >> full disclosure. i did, when i was stuck over christmas one year, i met a girl in the airport, and we pretended to be a couple so that we could get on a flight together. and by the end of the flight we were. that's all i'm saying. >> like this pair of strangers fined nearly 5 grand for getting ridiculously friendly on a flight from dallas to england. >> it turns out, they were each married to other people. >> even more alarming, the solo
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nude. >> imagine you're rolling the cart back and you get to the last row and there's a naked lady sitting in the row. but the great thing about her was she still had her seatbelt on. >> that's just unsanitary. next, the belligerent boozers. like our duct taped man who drank a bottle of liquor and started screaming, the plane is going to crash. so he was taped to his seat. listen to the moaning. >> oh. oh. >> 50 shades of plane. >> the passengers duct taped him. did you see that? >> inflight intoxication is such a problem in russia. >> lawmakers are banning duty free liquor on board. here's the cash though. there's no law in russia that would allow airlines to punish unruly customers. >> since this report aired,
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russia's largest carrier came out in support of making boozy behavior on board a criminal offense. earlier this year jenny lauren, niece of ralph and apparent passenger from hell was fined 2,700 bucks fromf ñ allegedly getting drunk and air raging. a flight attendant claims lauren called her a fat, unhappy blonde [ bleep ]. she told the new york post the allegations are all lies and claims the flight attendants threatened me. the law is very strict about alcohol up in the air. >> an airline cannot by federal law serve any passenger to the point of inebriation. >> do you cut people off if you think they're too drunk? >> of course. we have to. they might not know it. we have tricks. their jack and coke might become a lot of coke and a little jack. >> it's fine if you get drunk and pass out? s >> it's not okay if you pass
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out. if something goes wrong on the flight, we can't be taking 160 limp noodles off the airplane. >> remember gerard depardieu? apparently after a glass or two he relieved himself not in the traditional place but the aisle of a plane. he came clean on the graham norton show. >> yes, i peed on the plane. >> these days, bomb threats are also a reality and they aren't funny. watch a s.w.a.t. team storm a plane last month after a passenger said he wanted to blow up canada which kind of brings us to our next category. the scoff laws in the sky. a couple months ago this happened. >> some gentleman decided that he wanted us to visit the lord today. >> he tried to open the emergency exit at 30,000 feet en
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route from chicago to sacramento. he was subdued by a passenger until the law arrived. rug rats are considered the most unpopular passengers from hell. even though -- >> i really never saw an air rage incident caused by a kid and i've never seen a drunk and disorderly kid. >> they're just loud. >> they need to drive or have a plane for just babies. you want to scream, go ahead and get the screaming plane. >> glozelle is a comedian and internet star and frequently furious flier. >> get on a plane and everybody says we understand, but i don't. >> the next time i take my kids home to scotland, maybe i should take a boat. next, are you checking into a killer hotel, literally? >> we walk in and we found two more bodies. >> suddenly you realize that room 225 is a death trap.
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>> but is the killer still in the room with new guests checking in? >> everybody get out of the room. >> when vacations from hell returns. ♪ ♪ hanes. a perfect fit for every body. now in colorful new styles. ♪ i've been claritin clear for 8 days. at the first sign of your allergies, doctors recommended taking one claritin every day of your allergy season for continuous relief. 21 days! 14 days of continuous relief. live claritin clear. every day. olive garden's buy one, take one, starting at just $12.99. it's back, but not for long.
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3,000 feet up in the brisk blue ridge mountain air, the busy little town of boone, north carolina, as in daniel boone. he kamd here and 200 years later the tourists are still coming. >> it's a college town, one of those things that's like a small community. everyone knows everyone. >> where everyone is welcome at the best western hotel, cable tv, buffet breakfast and heated indoor pool and something they may not tell you at the front desk, a dark secret in room 225. the guests were dying. >> tell me about the day that you decided to drive up to boone. >> we were going to pick up our daughter from science camp.
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>> jeannie williams decided at the last minute to turn a day trip from the family farm in south carolina to an overnight adventure for her home schooled 11-year-old son jeffrey. they check into the best western in boone on june 7th, 2013. they were upgraded to room 225. >> was there anything unusual about the room? >> no. there was nothing. >> but something comes over jeannie. >> i started feeling bad, and just kind of a stomach ache kind of feeling. i thought maybe something i had eaten. >> in the bathroom it gets worse, 911 worse, but her phone is in the other room. >> i'm thinking, i just got to get to my own, and then that's the last thing i remember. and i fell, i guess. >> a clerk checks on room 225 and finds jeannie and jeffrey. they never left the room. >> ma'am, i've got two bodies and i need some help up here now.
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>> are they breathing? are they awake? >> no, no, they're not. please hurry. >> the next thing i remember is waking up in the hospital room. i couldn't talk. i guess that was from being in a coma. they handed me a note pad and a pencil or pen because i wanted to know where jeffrey was. >> jeannie scribbled a b for bit, her husband's pet name for her son. >> and that's when he told me that jeffrey was with jesus. and then he just kept telling me, be strong, i need you. i need you. >> how did jeffrey die? the first clue was in that 911 call from the best western. >> this just happened to us last month.
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please come help us. >> hear that? just happened to us last month. then she says it again. >> you don't understand. we just went through this. >> for emt mike first on the scene to rescue jeannie williams, the call to the best western and room 225 was eerily familiar. >> that sounds familiar. >> turns out, he had been on another call to that same room seven weeks earlier. >> i looked at my partner and said if i'm not mistaken that is the same room we had that last call. >> what's your reaction? >> we walk in and find two more bodies, same room. >> you realize room 225 is a death trap. >> yes. >> same hotel and same room. >> yes. then you start thinking something is going on. >> the first sign something was going on came six weeks before when a retired couple from washington state spent the night in room 225.
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when they didn't show up for breakfast, someone had gone to check on them, too. >> when she opened the door, she found shirley lying in the front entrance way near the bathroom and daryl was lying in the hot tub. they were both dead. >> hello. >> hello. tell me what's going on there. >> i just got in the room. there's two people, neither one of them are breathing. >> neither are breathing? >> no, ma'am. >> damon mallatere's company manages the hotel. he said he heard it was something much more mundane. >> the subsequent conversations i had from the police department indicated to me that the medical examiner was telling them he was pretty sure it was death by heart attack or natural causes. >> the medical examiner had not in fact determined that daryl and shirley jenkins died of fatal simultaneous heart attacks. he hadn't determined any cause
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of death. he had mailed off blood samples. hard to imagine anything more urgent than filing the killer of that couple. for some reason, the doctor did not ask the lab to put a rush on those samples. >> they sit there for 40 days until the first test is done. >> eventually like the morning fog that settles on this mountain town, the mystery just drifted away, unsolved. it was as if the entire town of boone shrunk. >> there was no sense of urgency to figure out what happened. there was a mystery that lingered, but i don't think it was in the forefront of people's mind. >> six weeks after the jenkins died, the hotel re-opened room 225. a week after that jeannie williams and her son jeffrey checked in. the killer in room 225 was back. >> get out of the room. everybody get out of the room. get out of the room. okay, ma'am, we're out. oh, ma'am, this is awful,
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please. >> when we come back, the killer revealed. and the businessman who could go to prison. >> i need to cut. please. >> okay. ♪ ooooohh!!! ♪ what it is, what you want? yeah. ♪ live your life right ♪ make the beat the bump ♪ the undeniable! ♪ come into the party in a b-boy stance ♪ i rock on the mic ♪ and make the world wanna dance ♪ fly like a dove ♪ that come from up above ♪ i'm rocking on the mic ♪ and you can call me mos love ♪ ooooohh!!! ♪ yeah yeah. yeah yeah. ♪ dunk,eady to crack, dip... it's crabfest at red lobster! the year's largest variety of crab! like new! crab lover's trio! or try new! jumbo lump crab over wood-grilled salmon. crabfest is now... but ends soon! so hurry in and sea food differently!
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foster farms chicken gets to the store in 48 hours or less. but it's 4 days to california. there's got to be another way. that could be any number of items, quite frankly. you know if this flight is less than 48 hours? i surwhat?e so.? foster farms. celebrating 75 years. always natural. always fresh. join the celebration at take75.com diverted to minneapolis... i think my giblets are frozen.
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>> room 225 at the best western in the tourist down of boone, north carolina, one room in just two months, three deaths. >> elderly male, elderly female. neither one is breathing. start cpr. >> first it was daryl and shirley jenkins found dead in room 225. >> is anyone there willing to attempt cpr. >> they're doing it right now. they've been doing it since we
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found them. four people are working on them and there's no response. >> that was april 16th. three days later the solinski family throws a birthday pool party and sleepover party for their daughter levi and 8 friends. they check into room 325. no one tells them about the tragedy in the room below. soon enough they have a disaster of their own. >> all girls were very sick, puking in bathtubs, sinks, toilets while i'm calling they are parents. they were falling like flies. it was scary. >> she said she complained to the front desk. >> i told them in the morning there is an environmental hazard in this room. >> damon mallatere who manages the hotel swears the clerk never told him. >> you were not informed by your employees that people had gotten sick in the room above 225? >> i wasn't. >> even though the medical
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examiner had not determined what killed the jenn kins' six weeks later mallatere re-opened room 225. >> we never would have re-opened that room if we had any thoughts whatsoever that there was something wrong or it would hurt somebody. >> the death trap was ready for its next victims. something in room 225 killed 11-year-old jeffrey williams and nearly took the life of his mother, jeannie. but this time an alert 911 operator realizes the deadly danger is right there in room 225. >> i'm going to need you just to go ahead and get out of that room. >> get out of the room. everybody get out of the room. get out of the room. >> first responders arrive. their hazmat detectors go crazy. they follow a toxic trail downstairs, past the pool and at last corner the killer, a faulty pool heater which generates carbon monoxide, an odorless, invisible, and deadly gas. the heater's exhaust pipe was supposed to conduct the carbon
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monoxide safely outside, but hidden under a drop ceiling right under room 225, state investigators find the pipe is busted, full of holes, propped up with a vhs cassette tape and a hotel ice bucket, spewing poison gas into the room above. mallatere, the manager, says he knew nothing of these problems. the attorney said soon after the jenn kins were killed, the family warned the best western that they suspected carbon monoxide was to blame, before jeffrey died. >> so they were warned before jeffrey died that there would be a carbon monoxide problem? >> absolutely. >> by the family of the people who had just been killed in that room and they didn't do anything about it? >> apparently if they did, it wasn't enough. >> the hotel manager at the time says authorities never mentioned carbon monoxide and just this week "20/20" obtained a report by north carolina state licensing authority that reveals that over the course of a decade, contractors and town
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inspectors missed multiple clues that may have prevented the deaths of all three victims. >> do you feel any responsibility for what happened? >> >> i don't believe that anybody in any way involved, whether it be the authorities or the contractors or my employees, or myself should go to bed tonight and not feel responsibility. >> what you're saying is it doesn't mean you're criminally culpable? >> i would never willfully hurt a guest if i knew that i could keep that from happening. >> the most outrageous failure of all? the state tells "20/20" it sent shirley jenkins toxicology report showing she had been killed by carbon monoxide to medical examiner brent hall on
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june 3rd, in plenty of time to save a little boy's life. jeffrey williams would not check in for another four days, but not a peep from dr. brent hall, not a single warning. >> is it possible that had the medical examiner who had the report, the autopsy, saying that it was carbon monoxide poisoning, that it killed the jenkins in the same room in which jeffrey williams was saying and he had delivered that report to the police, that jeffrey would still be alive? >> i absolutely agree with that. >> we went to dr. hall's office where the receptionist was unreceptive. i'm matt gutman from abc news. >> i'm not interested. >> hall resigned as the medical examiner. in january the grand jury handed out three counts of involuntary manslaughter and aggravated assault for the williams injuries. the da's office decided to submit to the grand jury one name, and that name being barry damon mallatere. >> how often do you think about
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this? >> every day. >> that boy, that elderly couple. >> every day. i need to cut. >> unlike smoke detectors, there is no federal requirement for carbon monoxide detectors in hotel rooms. some states, now including north carolina, do require them. pennsylvania does not. that's where another best western hotel pool heater malfunctioned over the weekend, causing carbon monoxide into the rooms. 200 people were evacuated, 28 of them sent to area hospitals. so turning grief into good works, the williams family created jeffreysfoundation.org to raise awareness about carbon monoxide poisoning. >> it's very simple. carbon monoxide detectors are cheap in the grand scheme of life.
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next, extreme vacations or just extreme craziness? from arch swinging to water slides, skydiving that almost became sky dying. >> and i literally looked up and said, this is what a dead person sees. >> we're strapping you in to see how he lived to tell, when vacations from hell returns. come into the sears labor day event. ♪ where you can shop more award winning appliances than anywhere else. ♪ plus save 40% or more on appliance super buys... like 42% off this kenmore refrigerator. and 43% off this kenmore laundry pair. ♪ get free delivery on all appliances over $399. sears. performance starts here. ♪ wel[thunder]he new cricket wireless.
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>> three, two, one. >> sometimes on summer vacation people go crazy. >> oh, my god! >> earlier this month these guys turned a trip downstream into this crazy stunt. in june, these guys decided it was a perfect day to jump off these cliffs into that current below. in july, i was in kansas city for the opening of the world's largest water slide. and out in utah, so many people are taking a death defying leap to swing off this natural arch, that the feds just announced they are considering making it illegal. most of us never do these things, but skydiving, that's
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another story. even former president george bush senior does it. he celebrated his 85th birthday skydiving five summers ago and was back out there again this june for his 90th. >> oh, yeah. >> sky diving is such a thrill, people jump over 3 million times a year. what could possibly turn that euphoria from the heavens to a vacation from hell story? >> do you have any inkling that anything was going wrong or could have gone wrong? >> no. >> craig stapleton knows. he wasn't on vacation but his day started out like he was, without a care in the world. >> we're ready. >> when we got into the plane last year, this champion sky diver already had 7,000 jumps under his chute. craig leapt out full of confidence from the usual 8,000 feet. the plan was to do a jump like this, unfurling an american flag with his teammates in the sky above lodi, california.
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but maybe a minute into the plunge, the plan goes horribly wrong. >> i know i'm in serious trouble. >> this is actual video of the jump. at 5 thousand feet his lines are tangled with the flag, his parachute useless. >> three or four seconds into the malfunction, i knew i was a dead man. i can't see the ground coming at me because it's still too far away, but i can hear the wind. it's not good news. at this point i'm probably doing 60 or 70 mills straight at the ground, helicoptering around. >> the chances were as you were falling towards the ground that you were going to die? >> i really felt i was on my last moment, hurdling at the earth. you have to fight the panic of, this is it. your brain starts banging through ideas right now, what do you have to do. as i got lower i was thinking about my teammates, my family,
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what i was going to miss out on. >> at 4,000 feet, the only hope left is reserve parachute. >> i pulled the reserve, the parachute comes out. >> you can see the reserve parachute on this shot. it's that white speck. but it doesn't work. it gets sucked right into the tangled lines of the orange chute. >> i literally looked up and said, this is what a dead person sees. >> this is what a dead man sees? >> this is what a dead man sees. >> only 1,000 feet below is a vineyard. not only are the grape vines jagged but poles and wires surrounding the field. landing on the wrong spot could leave him dismembered or impaled. that's craig right there in the final seconds curling up as skydivers are trained to do. at this point he says he's feeling at peace. >> it was quiet and then whomp.
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>> his partners land within seconds and sprint towards him, not knowing what to pect. >> i thought i was watching my friend about to die. >> don't move, craig! don't move! >> this is the best stuff you can land on right there. >> call it luck, call it divine intervention. >> i missed the wires, the stakes. i hit the soft dirt that they plowed. >> we're talking about four feet. >> yeah. >> he's alive! call for help! >> within ten minutes he's on his way to the e.r. >> no pun intended, but the sky is the limit in terms of injuries. anything could have happened to him. >> but incredibly, beyond his obvious bruises, mris and x-rays show no serious internal injuries. not a single broken bone, sprained ankle, wrist? >> no. miracles can happen. >> we don't know where craig
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plans to take his next vacation but if there's a sky dive, he'll be there. you got a free bee, you should have been dead and you survived. >> every day is a bonus day. go spend it right. next, sand, surf, and sonic booms? photo fakeouts that can make your vacation paradise seem closer to purgatory, like a landing strip right next door. >> it's so loud when those planes come through.
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who's more excited about back to school sthe moms? staples? or the dads? with guaranteed low prices on colored pencils, it's definitely the dads. staples. make more happen for less. so what ya got on deck? skyfall. lean in, then some pinterest, you? twitter. minecraft and then some hunger games. boom. wow, you guys are all set, huh? oh yeah, new amazon fire phone. it comes with amazon prime - tons of cool stuff for no extra charge. really? it comes with amazon prime? yeah, there's so much to watch. i've been on this earth nine years, i've never seen anything like it.
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>> hello? >> when it comes to vacations, you never know quite what you're going to get until you get there. >> a bed bug on the bed. >> stain on the sheet. >> i have very loud neighbors. >> so i was tasked with a simple mission, to see just how accurate those hotel marketing photos really are. as i boarded the plane for the caribbean, i was hesitant to trade the gray skies of new york city for the turquoise shores of st. maarten. st. maarten is known for its white sandy beaches, fine hotels, and those blaring 747s. princess juliana international is not just an airport. it's a tourist trap. every few minutes on the beach, at the hotel, at the bar, planes
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take off or land, all day long. on average, 60 planes land here every day. even though we've seen the videos on youtube, nothing could have prepared us for the plane's departure. tourists from far and wide throw caution to the wind. they curl their fingers around the chain link fence and hold on for dear life. >> i had no idea it was going to be that strong. >> tagging along with us, travel expert extraordinaire jane reynolds from oyster.com, a travel review site owned by trip advisor. their site is where the so-called photo fakeout is exposed. first up, the royal palm beach resort. their site boasts an inviting pool, a welcoming lobby, both are of course empty in the online pictures. but when we visited, not exactly what we saw online.
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>> everyone on our plane is here. >> our check-in? a 45-minute ordeal. next we head over to the storied french side. >> taking in an amazing view. what do you think so far? >> so far this hotel really bills itself accurately. it's on a beautiful piece of land looking over the water. >> this hotel came the closest to being as advertised, but we did learn another valuable lesson. just take a look at this online picture of the hotel pool. the photo is cropped, but in reality, there wasn't much pool to crop out. >> the pool here is more akin to a bathtub. >> they told us they're in the process of upgrading their photos, but a small pool paled in comparison to what he experienced at our next stop, mary's boone. one of the selling points in the description is that it's tucked away and conveniently near to the action. but maybe a little too close.
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it's just south of the airport and while we all enjoy the convenience of an airport hotel, come on. >> it's so loud when the planes come through. >> for people trying to get away? >> it's not the relaxing hidden you are expecting. >> while some were accurate portrayals and some were not, after all those hotel check-ins i was more than ready to check out. at least with the airport so close, i didn't have trouble making my flight. for one maryland-based man, his trip wasn't about the photos. the airport is where all his problems began. granada, spain, a gorgeous city tucked away in the shadow of the castle, the place of flamenco
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dancing. >> i had a conference in portugal. i saw it as my opportunity to finally get to spain. >> there was one major issue. spelling. grenada is spelled similarly to a small island nearly 4,000 miles away. >> within 20 minutes of departing we looked at this little monitor in front of us and the plane is heading west. i said to the flight attendant why west, why not south? we're going to spain. he said spain, what are you talking about? we're going to grenada. we're in the west indies. and my heart dropped. >> to turn his hellish trip around they flew from washington d.c. to london, to st. lucia, grenada, across the atlantic to london and finally to lisbon. three days, seven flights, and now no time for the castle. >> did any of the burden fall on
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you that you ended up in the wrong place? >> i don't feel that way because when i booked it with british air, not only was i specific on city and country, but i even gave airport codes. >> british airways tells us they've offered dr. gamson and his partner extensive assistance, including new flights to granada, spain, flights to an alternate destination and frequent flier points. he disputes those offers were made and sued for $34,000. >> it sounds like a lot but it's the composition of the prepaid expenses, the cost of the flight and this is a first class flight and the fact tha and next, starting to
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clear away the rubble and the wreckage of the napa quake and finding new help for victims. abc7 news begins in 60

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