Summary
Moss Hills and his wife Tracey have made a successful living as entertainers on cruises. They play guitar and sing – usually covering 60s and 70s hits – as guests dance until the early hours.
One stormy night in 1991 they were working on the Greek cruise liner Oceanos off the South African coast when the lights went out, the PA system fell silent and the ship rolled so much that just staying upright was a challenge.
Their actions in the face of extreme danger would affect almost all of the 581 people on board. Moss Hills tells Jane Garvey his life-changing story.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Before you listen to this BBC podcast, I want to tell you why I love podcasting. |
| 0:04.7 | Hi, my name's Tommy Dixon, and I make podcasts for the BBC. |
| 0:08.4 | I'm a big fan of stories, always loved a good book. |
| 0:11.4 | But when I started commuting for my first job, I discovered podcasts. |
| 0:15.4 | I was blown away by how a creative idea and the right mixture of sounds could take you into |
| 0:19.2 | a whole new world full of incredible stories. You know, the type that make you go, wow. And that kind of inspired me to |
| 0:25.2 | give it a go myself, which to cut a long story short led to a BBC training scheme and a whole |
| 0:30.0 | new career giving other people that exact same feeling. So if you want to hear amazing stories |
| 0:34.2 | that make you go wow like I did, they're just a tap or click away on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:40.8 | BBC Sounds, music, radio, podcasts. Hello, it's good to be back with a new series of conversations |
| 0:47.7 | about extraordinary once-in-a-lifetime experiences. Today, my guest is a man called Moss Hills. |
| 0:57.4 | He is a cruise ship entertainment director, |
| 1:03.8 | now based in Liverpool. In the 1990s, he was at sea one truly terrifying night, |
| 1:13.4 | when hundreds of lives came to depend in large part on him. Moss was born in Zimbabwe. As a young man, he went to South Africa to fulfil his showbiz ambitions and he joined a band. I was drumming. I was with a band called |
| 1:18.8 | Four Jackson and A Jill in South Africa. Successful band. Good name, by the way, sorry, I should have |
| 1:23.8 | reacted a bit quicker to that. Great name. Four Jackson and a Jill. |
| 1:28.0 | Four Jackson and a Jill. |
| 1:28.9 | And we had a couple of hits and a couple of international things. |
| 1:33.1 | But when I met and married my wife, I'd then go away on tour a lot. |
| 1:36.9 | And I was always away on tour. |
| 1:37.8 | And I love touring. |
| 1:39.0 | But it was the first time that I'd be away on tour and be backstage somewhere and be missing someone. I wanted to be |
... |
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