Singing helped lost bushwalker survive
JUNGLE survivor Joohee Han has told how singing her favourite song “Young Dumb & Broke” gave her the will to live.
The Korean bushwalker said she spent six days stuck in a mountain ravine “screaming, crying and shouting”.
“I was calling out ‘Help me, help me out, please’,” Ms Han, 25, said.
“It was very cold on the mountain. I was very hungry, but that was OK. I thought it was the cold that would kill me.
“I was high up. It was slippery. If I put a foot wrong it would’ve been instant death.”
The Tully banana farm worker fell from the summit of the 678m-high Mount Tyson, knocking herself unconscious for five or more hours, on June 1.
She tried to scramble down the mountain but ended up stuck on top of a waterfall for six days with no food before she was winched to safety by helicopter on Thursday.
She broke a front tooth and picked up only minor cuts and bruise in the fall.
Ms Han, whose story has made international headlines, said she kept singing the lyrics to her favourite song Khalid’s Young Dumb & Broke over and over to keep her spirits up.
She sang the tune: “I’m so high at the moment. I’m so caught up in this. Yeah, just young, dumb and broke. But I’ve still got love to give.”
A jubilant Ms Han, who was reunited with her rescuers from the Army’s jungle warfare training centre and Queensland Police at the Hotel Tully last night, said: “I love everyone.”
“I love my friends who alerted authorities I was missing, they saved my life. If they didn’t tell someone I’d still be up on the mountain, I’d be dead.
“I love my rescuers. I’m very happy, I’m very thankful to them. I love Tully and I love Australia. “I’m alive.” She plans to fly home to see her parents in Korea this week to get her broken tooth fixed but wants to return to Tully.
“Except this time I’m keeping my young, dumb feet on the ground,” Ms Han laughed.
“I’m not going back up that mountain.”