What to listen to next: History’s Toughest Heroes

13 Minutes Presents: The Space Shuttle

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary, History

9.5 • 4.7K Ratings

🗓️ 22 October 2025

⏱️ 29 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

13 Minutes will return with a new season in 2026 but in the meantime, we recommend History’s Toughest Heroes. The actor Ray Winstone tells stories of adventurers, rebels and survivors who lived life on the edge. These are tales of fearsome heroes from across history including arctic explorers, medieval knights and Hollywood stuntwomen. This episode is about an arctic explorer, trapped in a snow drift the size of a coffin. How will he survive frostbite and make it out alive?

Please note, this episode contains some vivid descriptions of what it is like to have frostbite. To listen to more episodes of History’s Toughest Heroes, search wherever you get your BBC podcasts.

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, podcasts.
0:07.3	Welcome back to the home of the oxymoron.
0:10.5	Evil genius.
0:11.6	He asked the newspaper to print his obituary early so he'd enjoy it.
0:15.5	That's like hiding at your own funeral.
0:17.1	Yeah, a bit great gig.
0:18.6	I'm Russell Kane.
0:19.6	Join me to weigh in on whether the biggest players in history are more evil or genius.
0:24.2	Becoming that rich, I'd say that is some level of genius.
0:26.4	It also helps that it's a long time ago, right?
0:29.4	It's like the podcast version of telling your kids the ice cream van plays music when it's out of ice cream.
0:34.9	Listen to Evil Genius on BBC Sounds.
0:38.3	Hello, 13 Minutes listeners. It's Maggie here. Often in 13 minutes, we've been hearing about
0:44.4	the bravery of the men and women who made these extraordinary space stories happen. Well,
0:49.6	if you've enjoyed learning about them, I think you'll also love history's toughest heroes. In this new
0:56.3	podcast season, the actor Ray Winston tells 10 stories of brave figures from history who encountered
1:03.0	life-threatening challenges, from the freezing Arctic to the American wilderness, and persevered
1:09.5	against the odds.
1:15.4	Keep listening for episode one of history's toughest heroes.
1:20.3	Just to give you a heads up, this episode contains some really vivid descriptions of what it's like to have frostbite.
1:23.8	Spring 1923, the Fox Basin of the Canadian Arctic.
1:29.3	A massive bloke lumbered through the snow.
	...

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