When 47-year-old Joan Murray‘s parachute malfunctioned during her 36th dive, she plummeted toward death. But instead of ground, her body met an unexpected army of angry fire ants.
On Jan. 25, 1999, Joan Murray, an experienced skydiver and banker from the U.S., jumped from a small plane over South Carolina. But what she thought would be just another dive suddenly turned into something terrible. Right after she jumped, her main chute malfunctioned. She hurtled toward the ground from about 14,500 feet, reaching roughly 80 miles per hour with no working parachute.
Though she managed to open her reserve chute, it tangled due to her constantly spinning, leaving Murray helpless. Unfortunately, at only about 700 feet above ground, the reserve chute also failed completely. At that point, survival seemed impossible. Most drops from anywhere above 80 feet are fatal, but fate had a wild twist in store for Murray.
How did ants save Joan Murray?
Instead of a deadly crash, Murray landed right on a mound of fire ants. Their colony was disturbed by Murray’s presence, and so, they began to sting her. Ironically, their venomous bites would become her lifeline. The ants reportedly stung her more than 200 times (via Tuko). With those stings, they injected toxins that triggered a massive adrenaline surge and kept her heart beating. As she was lying unconscious on the ground, paramedics arrived just in time.
Murray was found alive but in excruciating pain. Despite getting her heart jolted back to life, her injuries were catastrophic. She had several shattered bones, missing teeth, a fractured pelvis, and even a collapsed femur. She was immediately transferred to Carolina Medical Center, where doctors had to put her in a coma to treat her injuries.
Joan Murray’s miraculous recovery
20 reconstructive surgeries and 17 blood transfusions later, Murray survived. The 47-year-old refused to let the accident define her. Two years later, she returned to skydiving, completing more jumps despite the physical scars. Her story made headlines. Not because she survived an impossible 14,500-foot fall, but because she did it in the most improbable way imaginable.
The venom that might have killed her became a bizarre medicine. It’s almost like the army of stinging ants was sent by God. Murray eventually passed away on May 23, 2022, surrounded by her partner and daughters, after battling cancer for 29 months. But her miraculous survival story has now become a reminder that survival is more than physics or medicine. It’s sometimes a sting of nature and a stubborn will to live.
