Even if we'd been able to get him into an emergency ward at that moment we probably wouldn't have been able to save him because the damage to his heart was massive,' Justin said.

Not realising the severity of the attack, Justin continued to film, but when he panned back to Steve and saw him surrounded by a pool of blood, he knew something had gone very wrong.Īs the cameras rolled, he heaved Steve back onto their inflatable boat and sped back towards the main vessel, Croc One, as the star writhed in agony from the venom.īoth feared he'd suffered a punctured lung and the crew applied pressure to the massive wound on Steve's chest. However when the Crocodile Hunter passed over the creature, it raised its razor-sharp tail, stabbing him 'hundreds of strikes in a few seconds'. They expected the usually placid creature to swim away as they approached, giving them the perfect shot.

The naturalist spotted a 220lb ray lying on the ocean floor and with Justin, climbed into the chest-deep water. 'It should have been an innocent encounter for a TV show aimed at children.' John said at the time: 'Suddenly he said he was off to seek out some normally harmless stingrays. In a cruel twist of fate, Steve, 44, was not supposed to be out at sea on that fateful day - Septemas filming for his programme Ocean's Deadliest was called off due to bad weather.įinding himself bored at his hotel with cameraman Justin Lyons and director John Stainton, they took out a small boat on Batt Reef, off the coast of Port Douglas, in search of footage that could be used for his daughter's show instead - Bindi the Jungle Girl. Get the news you want straight to your inbox. If he died he would be sad if no one got it on tape.' Even if he is eaten by a shark or croc, the main thing he wants is that it be filmed. 'He tells his camera crew to always be filming,' his IMDb biographer Tommy Donovan once said. The freak incident off Australia's Great Barrier Reef that cost him his life was captured on film, but there is mystery as to where the footage lies to this day.

While Steve grappled with crocodiles, snakes and sharks, he had one rule that the cameras must be kept rolling - and his final moments were no different. The Crocodile Hunter 's death saw an outpouring of grief from fans across the globe - and even sparked a string of revenge attacks on stingrays on Australian shores that were condemned by the executive director of Steve's conservation group. Today marks 16 years since Steve Irwin tragically died after being stabbed in the heart by a stingray whilst doing what he loved best.

Leaked footage steve irwins death