The Island Series 3

22 March 2016

The Island with Bear Grylls, the ultimate survival challenge that abandons ordinary Britons on an uninhabited island in the Pacific, is back for a third series this Spring.

135,000 people thought they could handle the challenge but just 16 were finally chosen to take part. But in an El Nino year those 16 will face a long, hard battle against extreme weather conditions, environmental hazards and severely limited resources.

In an unexpected twist for many of the men and women, the experiment will break new ground by dropping eight members of each gender on the same land mass – but on different sides, blissfully unaware of the other’s existence unless they manage to find the other group of their own accord.

Bear Grylls explains:
"We wanted to take this season to the next level and putting men and women together was the natural progression. It is easy to assume that this will turn into a battle of the sexes – but in truth it is much deeper than that and is a battle for survival - that’s not about gender or how big and tough someone may look, that’s about mental strength & character.”

The women and later the men will arrive by boat with just the clothes they stand up in, filming equipment, basic medical supplies, enough water for 24 hours, a few simple tools and key survival training from Bear and his team. Across six episodes airing on Channel 4, they will become part of a select few who get to experience what it is really like to survive on their wits and determination.

This year’s Islanders come from a range of backgrounds and careers. A plumber, accountant, call centre manager, 58-year-old retired female farmer and a 19-year-old male student will be joined by a retired Army corporal – an amputee who lost a leg in battle – amongst others. All the Islanders will face their own personal battles, but for some, day-to-day life in such extreme conditions so removed from modern life may prove too much.

The 16 Islanders will once again include four trained crew (two men and two women) who film life on the island. The embedded crew will live alongside the other islanders in exactly the same conditions and facing the same challenges of finding food, water and shelter. All islanders will be able to film to candidly capture the highs and the lows of surviving with limited resources. There are also two doctors on the island who are the first port of call in any medical situation.

The Islanders can expect significantly different weather than in previous series thanks to the presence of the El Niño climate cycle, which has a significant impact on global weather patterns. For the Islanders, this is likely to mean increased rainfall as well as decreased fish stocks, a key food source.

 

Bear explains how these physical elements could have a knock-on effect on camp morale:
“Intense weather and torrential rain can be extremely draining on the mood in camp. Downpours make it difficult to hunt, to travel, and to maintain a watertight shelter to keep a fire going (which is crucial to purify water). When you’re constantly hungry, cold and wet, it’s easy for tensions to rise, especially when you’re living with what are essentially a group of strangers.”

 

As with the previous two seasons, islanders receive key survival training from Bear and his team prior to being left on the island. The groups must build any shelter from scratch as well as hunt for their own food and water. Though it has been ensured by Bear’s team that the island can sustain 16 people with sufficient indigenous resources to provide the camp with food, and a natural un-purified water source - it’s up to the men and women to use their initiative to find and exploit these resources.

However, once the women and then the men are dropped as close to the shore of the island as possible, they are alone. Each group is provided some basic tools and fishing equipment, including two knives and two machetes, whistles and a medical kit. They are also given enough water to last one day, and a radio and satellite phone in case of emergency.

Bear explains why he believes so many people want to experience life on The Island:
"People want to know what they are really made of when the chips are down and they are stripped of everything they take for granted. The men and women who took part in last year’s show faced possibly some of the toughest situations they will ever face again and despite everything the island threw at them, those that endured to the end showed that they possessed the spirit and fortitude not just to survive but also to thrive in such extreme adversity.”
“This season we picked an incredible group of regular men and women and it’s going to provide such powerful insight into the human psyche under pressure."