When he rolled over a steep cliff in Norway, Alec Rune knew his life was in danger.
I remember thinking, “This is really bad. This is the beginning of a disaster movie,” Rune said in an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper. “This is a moment when everything is really, really wrong.”
Rune, a 38-year-old climate journalist from Wisconsin, set out for a four-day lift in Forgefonna National Park in southwestern Norway in late July.
Rune, an experienced hiker who completed several solo trips in challenging circumstances, knows that cell service is uneven and warns his wife that communication from within the park is intermittent.
Things quickly failed.
On the first day of his hike, the only one of his left boots began to separate, and Rune patched the boots with athletic tape. Despite the early issues, Rune moved forward.
“I didn’t want to go back. It was just the beginning of the hike,” he said. “That was the first bad decision I made.”
Later that day, he reached his destination – the Bourbreen Glacier, the tongue of the third largest vast Forgehunna Glacier in the country. He then hiked to the ridge leading to a nearby valley.
“That’s when a disaster occurs,” Rune said.
The wrong step was that rune turned the side of the mountain.
“I remember first sliding down the mountains, rolling around the mountains, pinballing around the mountains,” he said.
When he finally stopped, Rune noticed that his left femur had snapped.
“My left foot was just floping, without direction,” he said. “I basically couldn’t move.”
His backpack was torn in the fall, with some belongings missing, including his cell phone and a water dining room.
It was Thursday and Rune realized he would likely need to survive in the wilderness for a few days. His wife did not expect any contact from him until Monday.
The first few days were “drought trials,” Rune said.
The sun dug a hole in the rune, which was barely protected from the heat.
He had some peanuts and granola bars but had a hard time eating without water.
“My mouth was so dry that the food turned into concrete in it, and I couldn’t swallow it,” he said.
Desperately hungry and dehydrated, Rune relies on drinking her own urine to survive in the end.
“The next time I had to pee, I peed on my water pouch,” he said.
Back in London, it turns out that his wife, Veronika Silchenko, was unable to board a return flight to the UK on Monday. She panicked and began notifying Norwegian authorities, Silkenko told CNN.
By the time Luhn’s search began, weather conditions at the park changed, and heavy rains hindered operations.
On the morning of Wednesday August 6th, Rune finally saw a faint glow of hope.
Things improved, and the Norwegian Red Cross mobilized a large team of volunteers, including specialized climbing teams and drones.
“I woke up in the morning. It was so cold and wet. There was a slight break in the weather, I could go through the valley and see a little sun coming in, and the helicopter came,” he said.
However, it was a tough six days in the wild, and Rune was experiencing hallucinations. He questioned whether the helicopter was the real thing.
Nevertheless, he shook it and cried out, trying to grab the crew’s attention. The aircraft moved without detecting Luhn.
Deciding not to miss a second chance at rescue, Rune pulls out a tent pole and ties it with a bandana to flag the helicopter.
After about 45 minutes it came back and began scanning the terrain.
“I was just waving, screaming on my own, and finally, the side door of the helicopter opened and someone turned to me,” Lu said.
After the rescue, Rune was treated at the hospital, where he was reunited with his wife.
“I said, ‘I love you,’ and she said,’ she said, ‘I’m going to tear you a new thing, but for now, I love you,’ Rune said.
This experience gave Rune a new lease in his life, he said.
“I was very lonely on that mountain. I didn’t see any other people nearby,” he said. “All the time I was there, I was thinking about how I would die on this hike I was trying to do. I never met my wife, parents, siblings or sisters again.”
“It was the most painful thing I could think of,” he said.
