Survivor: Africa

This article is about the third American Survivor season. For the African version of the franchise, see Survivor Africa: Panama.

Survivor: Africa
Season 3
Region 1 DVD cover
Presented by	Jeff Probst
No. of days	39
No. of castaways	16
Winner	Ethan Zohn
Runner-up	Kim Johnson
Location	Shaba National Reserve, Kenya
No. of episodes	14
Release
Original network	CBS
Original release	October 11, 2001 (2001-10-11) – January 10, 2002 (2002-01-10)
Additional information
Filming dates	July 11 (2001-07-11) – August 18, 2001 (2001-08-18)
Season chronology
← Previous The Australian Outback Next → Marquesas
List of episodes

Survivor: Africa is the third season of the American CBS competitive reality television series Survivor . The season was filmed from July 11, 2001, to August 18, 2001, in Kenya's Shaba National Reserve, and was aired weekly from October 11, 2001, until the live finale on January 10, 2002. Ethan Zohn was named Sole Survivor over Kim Johnson by a jury vote of 5–2, and won the $1,000,000 grand prize. The season featured a cast of 16 participants split between two tribes, Boran and Samburu. Three of the cast, Zohn, Lex van den Berghe, and Tom Buchanan all returned for future seasons. The season received more criticism than previous seasons due to the harsh living conditions of the African desert and the small amount of food for participants.

Filming of Survivor: Africa took place from July 11, 2001, to August 18, 2001, in Kenya's Shaba National Reserve. ^[1] The show was broadcast from October 11, 2001, until January 10, 2002, on CBS. ^{[2] [3]}

Contestants

The show's cast consists of 16 players who are divided into tribes named Boran and Samburu for the real-life Borana and Samburu tribes. After 12 days, three members of each team switched to the other tribe in what became known as the first "twist" in Survivor. When 10 contestants remained, the two tribes were merged into the Moto Maji tribe, which was named for the Swahili words for "fire" and "water".

List of Survivor: Africa contestants

Contestant	Age	From	Tribe			Finish
			Original	Switched	Merged	Placement	Day
Diane Ogden	42	Lincoln, Nebraska	Boran			1st voted out	Day 3
Jessie Camacho	26	Orlando, Florida				2nd voted out	Day 6
Carl Bilancione	46	Winter Springs, Florida	Samburu			3rd voted out	Day 9
Linda Spencer	44	Boston, Massachusetts				4th voted out	Day 12
Silas Gaither	23	Los Angeles, California		Boran		5th voted out	Day 15
Lindsey Richter	26	Portland, Oregon		Samburu		6th voted out	Day 18
Clarence Black	24	Detroit, Michigan	Boran	Boran	Moto Maji	7th voted out	Day 21
Kelly Goldsmith	22	San Diego, California		Samburu		8th voted out 1st jury member	Day 24
Brandon Quinton	25	Dallas, Texas	Samburu			9th voted out 2nd jury member	Day 27
Frank Garrison	43	Odessa, New York		Boran		10th voted out 3rd jury member	Day 30
Kim Powers	29	Conshohocken, Pennsylvania		Samburu		11th voted out 4th jury member	Day 33
Teresa Cooper	42	Jackson, Georgia		Boran		12th voted out 5th jury member	Day 36
Tom Buchanan	45	Rich Valley, Virginia	Boran	Samburu		13th voted out 6th jury member	Day 37
Lex van den Berghe	38	Santa Cruz, California				14th voted out 7th jury member	Day 38
Kim Johnson	56	Oyster Bay, New York		Boran		Runner-up	Day 39
Ethan Zohn	27	New York City, New York				Sole Survivor

Future appearances

Since the broadcast of Survivor: Africa, Ethan Zohn competed again with Lex van den Berghe and Tom Buchanan on Survivor: All-Stars . Zohn also competed on Survivor: Winners at War . In 2015, Teresa Cooper was included on the public poll to choose the cast of Survivor: Cambodia but was not chosen to compete. ^[4]

Outside of Survivor, Zohn competed on a "Reality All-Stars" episode of Fear Factor , ^[5] and also competed on The Amazing Race 19 with then-girlfriend and fellow Survivor winner Jenna Morasca. ^[6]

Season summary

The Shaba National Reserve in Kenya

The 16 castaways were split into tribes named Samburu and Boran, and were given camps that included fencing to help protect them from wildlife. Samburu took an early lead but the tribe was internally divided along age lines – Silas, Kim Powers, Brandon, and Lindsey as one, and Frank, Teresa, Carl, and Linda as the other. At their first Tribal Council, the age blocs left a stalemate tie between Carl and Lindsey, and with no previous votes to count, a quiz was used. Lindsay won and put the younger members in control. On the next visit to Tribal Council, Linda was eliminated and both tribes were even at six members. On day 13, the tribes were given a vague clue about sending three members on a quest but were unaware this would be the first tribal swap. Silas picked himself and the remaining older Samburu, Frank and Teresa. Kelly, Tom, and Lex were picked for Boran. After being informed of the tribal swap, these players joined their new tribes; Frank and Teresa quickly went to work with the original Boran members to eliminate Silas while the original Boran members on Samburu learned of Lindsay's past votes and were able to eliminate her.

Once 10 players remained – six from the original Boran and four from Samburu – the tribes were merged into a single tribe called Moto Maji. Samburu members were aware that the Boran players were sticking with original alliances and scrambled to stay in. During the first post-merger Tribal Council, a mystery vote was cast for Lex, sending him on a witch hunt. Deciding it had been Kelly, a member of his alliance who had voted against him, Lex asked his alliance to turn against one of their own. When Kelly found out what was going to happen, she banded with the Samburu members, but Lex had also persuaded Brandon to vote with his alliance, leading to Kelly's elimination. Brandon's disloyalty to Samburu led to his elimination and that of the other remaining Samburu members.

The final four players were Ethan, Lex, Tom, and Kim Johnson. Kim won the last two immunity challenges, Tom was voted out, and then Lex was voted out by Kim's vote. At the final Tribal Council, Kim was praised for surviving the game but was accused of riding the coattails of Lex, Ethan, and Tom. Ethan was praised for his likeability and integrity, and the jury voted Ethan the Sole Survivor in a 5–2 vote.

Challenge winners and eliminations by episode

Episode			Challenge winner(s)		Eliminated
No.	Title	Original air date	Reward	Immunity	Tribe	Player
1	"Question of Trust"	October 11, 2001	Samburu		Boran	Diane
2	"Who's Zooming Whom?"	October 18, 2001	Samburu	Samburu	Boran	Jessie
3	"The Gods Are Angry"	October 25, 2001	Boran	Boran	Samburu	Carl
4	"The Young and Untrusted"	November 1, 2001	Samburu	Boran	Samburu	Linda
5	"The Twist"	November 8, 2001	Boran	Samburu	Boran	Silas
6	"I'd Never Do It To You"	November 15, 2001	Samburu	Boran	Samburu	Lindsey
7	"Will There Be a Feast Tonight?"	November 22, 2001	None [a]	Teresa	Moto Maji	Clarence
8	"The First 21 Days"	November 29, 2001	Recap Episode
9	"Smoking Out the Snake"	December 6, 2001	Ethan [Lex]	Ethan	Moto Maji	Kelly
10	"Dinner, Movie and a Betrayal"	December 13, 2001	Brandon, Frank	Lex		Brandon
11	"We Are Family"	December 20, 2001	Survivor Auction	Lex		Frank
12	"The Big Adventure"	December 27, 2001	Lex [Tom]	Tom		Kim P.
13	"Truth Be Told"	January 3, 2002	Lex	Lex		Teresa
14	"The Final Four: No Regrets"	January 10, 2002	None	Kim J.		Tom
				Kim J.		Lex
15	"The Reunion"

In the case of multiple tribes or castaways who win reward or immunity, they are listed in order of finish, or alphabetically where it was a team effort; where one castaway won and invited others, the invitees are in brackets.

1. There was no reward challenge due to the merge.

Episodes

No. overall	No. in season	Title	CBS recap	Original air date	U.S. viewers (millions)	Rating/share (18–49)
31	1	"Question of Trust"	Recap	October 11, 2001 (2001-10-11)	23.84 [7]	10.4/20 [8]
32	2	"Who's Zooming Whom?"	Recap	October 18, 2001 (2001-10-18)	19.59 [9]	7.9/20 [8]
33	3	"The Gods Are Angry"	Recap	October 25, 2001 (2001-10-25)	20.43 [10]	8.0/20 [8]
34	4	"The Young and Untrusted"	Recap	November 1, 2001 (2001-11-01)	18.73 [11]	7.8/18 [8]
35	5	"The Twist"	Recap	November 8, 2001 (2001-11-08)	20.55 [12]	8.3/20 [8]
36	6	"I'd Never Do It To You"	Recap	November 15, 2001 (2001-11-15)	19.71 [13]	8.1/21 [8]
37	7	"Will There Be a Feast Tonight?"	Recap	November 22, 2001 (2001-11-22)	17.70 [14]	6.6/18 [8]
38	8	"The First 21 Days"	N/A	November 29, 2001 (2001-11-29)	17.80 [15]	7.1/18 [16]
39	9	"Smoking Out the Snake"	Recap	December 6, 2001 (2001-12-06)	19.28 [17]	7.9/21 [8]
40	10	"Dinner, Movie and a Betrayal"	Recap	December 13, 2001 (2001-12-13)	18.39 [18]	7.3/20 [8]
41	11	"We Are Family"	Recap	December 20, 2001 (2001-12-20)	19.60 [19]	7.7/22 [8]
42	12	"The Big Adventure"	Recap	December 27, 2001 (2001-12-27)	18.92 [20]	7.5/20 [8]
43	13	"Truth Be Told"	Recap	January 3, 2002 (2002-01-03)	21.31 [21]	8.7/20 [8]
44	14	"The Final Four: No Regrets"	Recap	January 10, 2002 (2002-01-10)	27.26 [22]	11.3/25 [8]
45	15	"The Reunion"	N/A	January 10, 2002 (2002-01-10)	19.05 [22]	8.7/20 [8]

Voting history

	Original tribes						Switched tribes				Merged tribe
Episode	1	2	3			4	5	6			7	9	10	11	12	13	14
Day	3	6	9			12	15	18			21	24	27	30	33	36	37	38
Tribe	Boran	Boran	Samburu			Samburu	Boran	Samburu			Moto Maji	Moto Maji	Moto Maji	Moto Maji	Moto Maji	Moto Maji	Moto Maji	Moto Maji
Eliminated	Diane	Jessie	Tie [a]	Tie [b]	Carl	Linda	Silas	Tie [a]	Tie [c]	Lindsey	Clarence	Kelly	Brandon	Frank	Kim P.	Teresa	Tom	Lex
Vote	6–2	5–2	4–4	3–3	Challenge [b]	4–3	5–1	3–3	2–2	Countback [c]	8–2	5–4	6–2	6–1	4–2	4–1	3–1	1–0
Voter	Votes
Ethan	Diane	Jessie					Silas				Clarence	Kelly	Brandon	Frank	Kim P.	Teresa	Tom	None [d]
Kim J.	Diane	Jessie					Silas				Clarence	Kelly	Brandon	Frank	Kim P.	Teresa	Tom	Lex
Lex	Diane	Jessie						Lindsey	Lindsey		Clarence	Kelly	Frank	Frank	Kim P.	Teresa	Tom	None [d]
Tom	Clarence	Clarence						Lindsey	None [e]	0 Votes [c]	Clarence	Kelly	Brandon	Frank	Kim P.	Teresa	Lex
Teresa			Lindsey	Lindsey		Silas	Silas				Lex	Lex	Brandon	Frank	Lex	Tom
Kim P.			Carl	Carl		Linda		Tom	Tom		Clarence	Lex	Brandon	Frank	Lex
Frank			Lindsey	Lindsey		Silas	Silas				Clarence	Lex	Brandon	Kim J.
Brandon			Carl	Carl		Linda		Tom	Tom		Clarence	Kelly	Frank
Kelly	Diane	Jessie						Lindsey	Lindsey		Clarence	Lex
Clarence	Diane	Jessie					Silas				Lex
Lindsey			Carl	None [f]	Won [b]	Linda		Tom	None [e]	4 Votes [c]
Silas			Carl	Carl		Linda	Frank
Linda			Lindsey	Lindsey		Silas
Carl			Lindsey	None [f]	Lost [b]
Jessie	Diane	Clarence
Diane	Clarence

Jury vote
Episode	15
Day	39
Finalist	Ethan	Kim J.
Votes	5–2
Juror	Votes
Lex
Tom
Teresa
Kim P.
Frank
Brandon
Kelly

Notes

1. The first Tribal Council vote resulted in a tie. A second vote was held where the castaways involved in the tie would not vote and the remaining castaways could only vote for those who tied.
2. After two rounds of voting between Lindsey and Carl, Tribal Council remained tied. As this was Samburu's first Tribal Council, no castaway had prior votes and a countback could not be called. Lindsey and Carl competed in a nature quiz tiebreaker, which Carl lost.
3. After two tied votes between Lindsey and Tom, a Tribal Council countback was called as a tiebreaker. Tom had no previous votes but Lindsey had four, therefore Lindsey was eliminated.
4. Ethan and Lex did not vote, as the only eligible players they could only vote for each other.
5. Lindsey and Tom were not eligible to vote in the second Tribal Council vote.
6. Carl and Lindsey were not eligible to vote in the second Tribal Council vote.

Reception

Survivor: Africa received much more criticism than the two previous seasons, primarily for the contestants' tough living conditions during filming. Dalton Ross of Entertainment Weekly ranked it as the ninth-worst season of the series, saying aside from "Some great challenges, not that much else was great". ^[23] Tom Santilli of Examiner.com ranked it 26th, saying following Borneo and Australian Outback , "it was a complete dud at the time", while noting winner Ethan Zohn "was just so-so and not that interesting", and that the cast's "lethargy showed on screen" due to the poor conditions in the filming location. In 2020, fan site "The Purple Rock Podcast" also ranked the season 29th, and said it "suffers because of its location" and that "the cast on this season is generally pretty decent, and probably would have been much better if they weren't constantly sapped of energy by lack of food and water". ^[24] In 2015, a poll by Rob Has a Podcast ranked Survivor: Africa 19th out of 30 with Rob Cesternino ranking this season 26th. ^[25] This was updated in 2021 during Cesternino's podcast "Survivor All-Time Top 40 Rankings", ranking Survivor: Africa 21st out of 40. ^{[26] [27]} In 2013, Andrea Deiher of Zap2it ranked the season the fifth-worst before it was replaced in 2015 by Survivor: San Juan del Sur . ^{[28] [29]} In 2020, Inside Survivor ranked this season 23rd out of 40, saying; "Is it the most dynamic season in terms of gameplay? No. But it is rich in character." ^[30]

Controversy

Controversy surrounded an immunity challenge in the final episode of Survivor: Africa. In the "Fallen Comrades" challenge, in which the contestants were quizzed on trivia about their fellow players who had been voted out, the final question is "Which female contestant has no piercings?". The official answer, given by Kim Johnson to win the challenge, was Kelly. Lex answered Lindsey, who, unbeknownst to the producers, also had no piercings. Had Lex been given credit for his correct answer, he and Kim would have tied and faced tie-breaker questions. After the producers were alerted to the mistake, both third-place finisher Lex and fourth-place finisher Tom were awarded the $100,000 runner-up prize instead of the usual third- and fourth-place earnings. ^{[31] [32]}

References

1. Lacey, Marc (August 13, 2001). "Shaba National Reserve Journal; TV Adventure Show Ignores the Real Survivors (Published 2001)". The New York Times . Retrieved August 19, 2022.
2. Wilkes, Neil (September 27, 2001). "Survivor: Africa cast introduced". Digital Spy . Retrieved June 13, 2024.
3. "Teresa Cooper says 'Survivor: Africa' cast was protected with guns". Entertainment Weekly .
4. "Survivor Contestant Database, by season: Seasons 41-50". truedorktimes.com.
5. "Episode 4.24 (Reality All-Stars) – February 28". Game Show Newsnet. Retrieved December 20, 2019.
6. Ross, Dalton (August 31, 2011). "'Survivor' winners Ethan and Jenna head up new 'Amazing Race' cast. Plus: New twists revealed! – EXCLUSIVE". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved May 30, 2020.
7. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 10/08/01 – 10/14/01". Zap2it. Archived from the original on June 9, 2003. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
8. "SpotVault – Survivor Africa (CBS). Fall 2001 Original Ratings". Spotted Ratings. December 8, 2011. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
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15. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 11/26/01 – 12/02/01". Zap2it. Archived from the original on April 15, 2003. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
16. "Broadcast & Cable Nielsens: Week Ending December 2, 2001". RatingsRyan. Retrieved March 11, 2023.
17. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 12/03/01 – 12/09/01". Zap2it. Archived from the original on April 27, 2003. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
18. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 12/10/01 – 12/16/01". Zap2it. Archived from the original on April 27, 2003. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
19. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 12/17/01 – 12/23/01". Zap2it. Archived from the original on June 15, 2002. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
20. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 12/24/01 – 12/30/01". Zap2it. Archived from the original on April 27, 2003. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
21. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 12/31/01 – 01/06/02". Zap2it. Archived from the original on April 27, 2003. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
22. "Top 20 Network Primetime Report. Week of 01/07/02 – 01/13/02". Zap2it. Archived from the original on April 27, 2003. Retrieved July 27, 2020.
23. Ross, Dalton (May 6, 2020). "Survivor Winners at War recap: Double elimination smackdown!". Entertainment Weekly . Retrieved May 13, 2021.
24. "Survivor season rankings (with spoiler-free summaries)". The Purple Rock Survivor Podcast. May 22, 2020. Retrieved February 17, 2021.
25. "Survivor Top 30 All-Time Season Rankings Results". Rob Has a Podcast . September 21, 2015.
26. "Survivor All-Time Top 40 Rankings | #21: Africa PART ONE". Rob Has a Podcast . May 19, 2021. Retrieved May 20, 2021.
27. "Survivor All-Time Top 40 Rankings | #21: Africa PART TWO". Rob Has a Podcast . May 20, 2021. Retrieved May 20, 2021.
28. "'Survivor's' 10 best and 5 worst seasons: How will 'Blood vs. Water' rank?". Zap2it . December 10, 2013. Archived from the original on April 16, 2014.
29. "The 10 best and 5 worst 'Survivor' seasons, ranked". Zap2it . Archived from the original on December 17, 2015. Retrieved December 22, 2015.
30. Holmes, Martin (October 21, 2020). "Best Season Rankings – No. 23 – Africa". Inside Survivor. Retrieved May 13, 2021.
31. "Bronze 'Survivor' Winners Get Silver". People .
32. "Piercing Error Leads To More Prize Money For 2 'Survivor' Contestants". CBS 19 (WOIO). Associated Press. February 21, 2002.

External links

• Official CBS Survivor Africa website