Jonathan W. Colby

This is the epic story of a B-24 'Liberator' bomber aircraft called 'Shady Lady', that took off from Darwin, Australia, on Friday, 13th August 1943, on what was at that time, the world's longest ever attempted bombing mission. Under the command of 'Doug' Craig, 'Shady Lady' set off with 10 other aircraft to attack the oil refineries at Balikpapan, Borneo. With the target hundreds of miles behind enemy lines, this was an audacious attempt to strike back at the Imperial Japanese Army. 'Shady Lady' survived intense tropical thunderstorms, serious turbulence, heavy enemy antiaircraft fire and was chased by Japanese Zero fighters - but never made it back to base. 'Shady Lady,' after 16 hours and 35 minutes in the air, ran out of fuel and was crash-landed in a salt-pan, in the remotest part of Northern Australia. Local support from the Aborigines and a massive rescue mission amazingly saw 'Shady Lady' - fly again.

Primal Fear" goes beyond the innate terror associated with our deepest fears to examine the history, psychology, and science behind what scares us most. Each fear - being burned alive under six feet of suffocating dirt, the strike of a lethal snake, terrorist attacks that can occur at any time - will be explored by looking at its history, the science behind it, and contemporary survivor stories that relate what a near-death experience was like.