Survivor: The Australian Outback

Survivor: The Australian Outback (also called Survivor: Australia in later seasons) is the second season of the United States reality show Survivor. Filming took place at Goshen Station in northern Queensland between late October and early December 2000, and aired from January 28 to May 3, 2001 on CBS. The location used was within a three hour drive of the coastal city of Cairns and located in a wet, tropical area. It was the top-rated show of 2001, according to Nielsen Ratings, ranging at 30 million viewers watching weekly.

Fourteen weekly episodes were aired, the premiere airing immediately after Super Bowl XXXV. The winner, Tina Wesson, was announced on May 3, 2001, when she defeated Colby Donaldson by a 4-3 vote.

The entire season was released in DVD format on April 26, 2005.

Twist/Changes

 * Longer Game: The game lasted 42 days, three days longer than the previous season. After this season, the game reverted back to the standard 39-day format.


 * Past Votes Tiebreaker: In an event of a tie vote, a revote would take place. If there is still a stalemate after the second round of voting, the votes cast against the players in question at previous Tribal Councils will also be counted. The castaway that had more votes would be eliminated from the game.

Season Summary
Tribe assignments were determined before the game began. The two tribes were named Ogakor (crocodile) and Kucha (kangaroo). Ogakor was a slightly weaker tribe, and after five players were eliminated, they were down five players to Kucha's six. On Day 17, however, Kucha's Michael Skupin, who was a powerhouse for his tribe, fell into the camp fire and suffered third-degree burns, requiring his evacuation and leaving the two tribes equal when they merged. As a result, the vote at the first Tribal Council after the merge ended in a tie along tribal lines. According to the rules of this season, a tie vote would be resolved based on which player had received the most votes in all previous Tribal Councils. As a result, former Kucha member Jeff Varner was eliminated, thus the power has shifted to the remaining members of Ogakor.

The remaining Ogakor tribe members, particularly Tina Wesson, Colby Donaldson, and Keith Famie, stayed a strong group and voted off the remaining Kucha, while also removing close allies Jerri Manthey and Amber Brkich when they threatened to usurp their power.

The merged tribe was wasteful with food and ended up with almost nothing left close to the end of the game. Jeff Probst approached the tribe and offered them a new supply of rice in exchange for giving up their tarps and a giant Texas flag that Colby brought as a personal item (which was also used as a tarp). The tribe also built their new camp in a dried wash basin, and while everybody was away on a challenge, a flash storm caused the wash basin to flood, wiping away much of their camp including the new supply of rice, which Tina barely managed to recover.

The Tina-Colby-Keith alliance stayed together to the end. When Colby won the final Immunity Challenge, he took Tina with him to the Final Tribal Council because he thought she was more worthy. This decision cost Colby the win, as Tina's strategic planning was valued by the Jury more than Colby's prowess in challenges, and she won the title of Sole Survivor by 4 votes to 3.

Trivia

 * The Tribal Council set was located on the majestic rock cliffs beside the Herbert River falls.
 * This season has the most first-time participants returning in future seasons with 6: Alicia Calaway and Amber Brkich returned in ; Colby Donaldson and Jerri Manthey returned in both and ; Michael Skupin returned in ; and Tina Wesson returned in both  and.
 * Australia is the season with the highest number of representatives on a future season (5 on All-Stars).
 * now has the most contestants returning in future seasons, whether first-time participants or returnees, with 7.
 * This is the first season to feature a live finale, as opposed to the previous season, which had the winner revealed on set.
 * This is the only season that lasted 42 days instead of the standard 39. Until Blood vs. Water, this would be the only season to last longer than 39 days.
 * Winner Tina oddly enough competed in both seasons spanning longer than 39 days.
 * This season saw the first time a contestant was medically evacuated when Michael Skupin fell into a fire and burned his hands.
 * This is the only season to have a "final three" episode.
 * Dawn Meehan and Mikey Bortone originally auditioned for this season.
 * This is the only season in which Jeff Probst sat to the contestants' right at Tribal Council.
 * Every time a future season included players from this season at least one player lasted until the final episode.
 * This is the only season where Colby Donaldson outlasts Jerri Manthey.

Controversy
During a reward trip, Colby Donaldson removed corals from the Great Barrier Reef and in the same trip, a helicopter of the production crew flew around protected sea bird rookeries. Both acts violated Australian law and the incidents could have resulted in fines up to 110,000 AU. Mark Burnett, the executive producer, issued an apology on behalf of Donaldson and the Survivor crew.