Jon Sopel: How close have you come to death?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

A recurring Guardian Q&A prompt asked directly across respondents and years.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

Recorded Jon Sopel said elsewhere, not written here

I’ve had motorcycle accidents – I had one where I ended up in intensive care. But if you are on a frontline – which I have been – and people start shooting at you – which they have done – you put yourself in quite considerable danger. So: on a moving frontline in northern Afghanistan in 2001.

The Q&A, The Guardian, 12 October 2024 source ↗

Others on this question

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Adrian Edmondson English actor, comedian, musician and writer

I hit a bit of lumpy tarmac driving my motorbike over the Pyrenees in the early 1980s. There was no safety barrier and I found myself riding along the edge of a precipice on half the width of the tyres for 100 yards.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 7 July 2018 source ↗

Robert Peston British journalist

Being driven across the Atlas Mountains in a snowstorm 25 years ago, by a local taxi driver who plainly put a lower premium on the advantages of living than me.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 23 June 2018 source ↗

Courtney Pine British jazz musician

We were doing a tour in Japan and as our plane landed, it rose again, out of the blue. About 10 years later there was this programme about 10 of the nearest misses, and it was my flight. There was another plane on the runway and we nearly landed on top of it. I didn’t know until 10 years later.

Recorded The Guardian, The Q&A, The Guardian, 24 September 2022 source ↗

Shappi Khorsandi Iranian-born British comedian