When it rained, it really poured for the contestants of Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen X.
For the first time in Survivor‘s 32 seasons, all of the contestants had to be evacuated from Fiji due to Tropical Cyclone Zena.
After last season’s harsh conditions on Survivor: Kaoh Rong in Cambodia led to three medical evacuations, this is the first time in the show’s history that the cast and crew were forced to evacuate because of weather.
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In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, host Jeff Probst revealed that the cast of the upcoming Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen X had to be temporarily pulled from the game as the cyclone hit the island on April 6, only the second day of production.
“For 32 seasons of Survivor, we’ve been very lucky to have escaped some severe storms,” Probst says. “This time, the storm caught us. It was only day two and in a matter of hours, a nice afternoon turned into a severe rainstorm that kept growing in intensity by the hour.”
“We were monitoring the weather minute-by-minute back at base camp,” Probst says. “When the national Fijian weather service upgraded it to a cyclone, we had to evacuate both tribes from their beaches and get them to safety.”
There have been some close calls with Mother Nature in past seasons of Survivor: the production narrowly avoided the 2009 tsunami that struck Samoa three weeks after production, decimating parts of the island used for filming. The weather in Fiji will be a big part of the new season, which premieres Sept. 21 on Global.
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“Weather does play a part in the show, and you will see the part it plays, and it’s a first,” Probst says, teasing the new season. “And it was scary.”
The new season will pit two generations against one another, splitting the tribes by age.
The reaction to the evacuation news prompted very different responses from the two tribes.
“It was very interesting how the two groups responded to the news. The Gen-X tribe was responsible and very concerned about their well-being,” Probst recalls. “The millennials were less concerned about their safety and more excited that they were making Survivor history.”
With files from Dani-Elle Dubé
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