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A Survivor Greece contestant who survived a life-altering accident while on the show is now suing the show for $100 million US.
On Sept. 3, Stavros Floros filed a complaint in Miami, Fla., following an accident that left him with injuries to both his legs.
The injury occurred earlier this year while Floros was fishing in the Dominican Republic, prompting the suspension of the program’s broadcasts on Greek television.
As the story goes, he was spearfishing off Saona Island. Authorities and production company AcunMedya said Floros was “diving without a surface marker buoy in an area frequented by tourist vessels” when a boat “accidentally struck him.”
Floros sustained severe injuries to his legs from the vessel’s engine propellers, including a partial amputation of the left leg and significant trauma to the right ankle.
The production company released a statement following the incident.
Difference in opinion
“According to the information available so far, the accident appears to have happened when a tourist boat injured the contestant while he was spearfishing outside the competitive process of the reality show,” AcunMedya wrote back in May. “From the very first moment, there was an immediate response to provide assistance and safely transport the injured contestant. The contestant remains hospitalized in serious but stable condition and is out of danger.”
That is not the way Floros interpreted the incident.
He accused the producers of negligence, alleging that “the producers built the show’s entire format around requiring contestants to spearfish in open water — waters heavily trafficked by tourist boats near Bayahibe, Dominican Republic — without safety boats, spotters, protected zones, or adequate warning markers, despite prior near-misses and even a prior fatality in the exact same waters.”
The plaintiff also claims that “only a tourniquet” applied to his injury “kept him alive.” He was transported to a hospital in Miami and underwent “multiple surgeries over a gruelling 61-day hospitalization.”
The lawsuit names AcunMedya, AcunMedya Global, Acun LLC, media mogul Acun Ilicali and Skai TV as the liable parties and defendants.
— With files from Brian Towie
ganderson@postmedia.com