Friday, October 12, 2001
Smyth County resident Tom Buchanan survived the first episode of "Survivor: Africa"
Big Tom came up with water but no fire

By PAUL DELLINGER
THE ROANOKE TIMES

   RICH VALLEY - Big Tom survived the first episode of CBS-TV's "Survivor: Africa" series, which he watched with about 20 family members, friends and neighbors Thursday night.

    Tom Buchanan, a Smyth County cattle and goat farmer, is forbidden by the show's contract to reveal anything about what happened - at least until it happens on screen.

    So Buchanan, 46, hung back while the rest of the crowd in Charlie Clark's home sat riveted to the television when the show finally started. It had been delayed by President Bush's news conference, which ran during its original 8 to 9 p.m. slot.

    "This being a little rural community, we're real excited," said John Morgan, who was one of Buchanan's high school teachers.

    The 6-foot-3 Buchanan wore his customary overalls, a T-shirt, cap and open-toed sandals. The group turned the viewing into a festive occasion with a dining room table full of potluck foods. Some wore T-shirts with lettering on the back stating that "I partied with Big Tom - and Survived."

    The "Survivor: Africa" series started with 16 contestants - a diverse group of men and women including a bartender, account executive, mail carrier and flight attendant - and split them into two teams of eight after depositing them in Kenya's 59,000-acre Shaba National Reserve. The introductory segment showed enough leopards, giraffes and zebras for a Tarzan movie.

    One of the 16 will win $1 million. The rest will be eliminated during the 39 days covered by the show, taped this summer.

    Each team had to walk five miles in the African heat before they found water. Soon, they were discarding many of the supplies with which they started , including tomato plants. "We're going on safari, not a garden party," Buchanan commented on the screen.

    The early close-ups and comments focusing on Buchanan brought whoops or cheers from onlookers.

    Buchanan commented from his farm experience on how one sheep would go down a hole and the rest would follow. "And here we were following this one girl through the desert, zigzagging."

    The only sustenance for a time was a can of cherries, which the eight passed around. One team member named Clarence, others noted, ate more than the one cherry to which everyone else was limited.

    Buchanan was the one who finally found the water, but it had to be boiled before anyone could drink it. And nobody on his team could manage to rub two sticks together effectively enough to start a fire.

    They finally started one by dismantling a small telescope and using its lens to focus sunlight onto some dry grass.

    In the first competition, each team had to push a cart, weighing perhaps 400 pounds, to three points, trying to be the first to light a torch at each point.

    Although Buchanan's team led most of the way, its cart bogged down before the finish, and the other team got its torches lighted first. That meant Buchanan's team had to vote out one of its members.

    The choice was between a woman named Diane, who had collapsed during the race, perhaps contributing to the team's loss, and Clarence, who had opened a can of beans when he was alone in camp, ostensibly to feed Diane and help her recover .

    But he eventually confessed that he had eaten some of them himself. Buchanan voted for his elimination, as did Diane. But the other six team members voted Diane out, and Buchanan's team returned to camp to mend their fences before the next obstacles that will be thrown at them in future shows.

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