Richard Hammond sits down with the Mirror and recalls the near-death experience while filming in the deserts of Southern Africa. Many of the adventures come with a degree of risk, but it seems that Mr. Hammond always seems to bear the brunt of the actual danger.

It was almost 10 years ago that Hammond almost died while trying to become the fastest man in the UK and now we hear of this story where the crew of The Grand Tour ended up lost in the desert where Hammond had to sleep under the buggies, even some times burrowing next to Jeremy Clarkson for heat.

“We never made it to our allocated sleep points, wherever those were. We slept under our buggies for a few nights. It got so cold I slept with socks on my hands. Don’t even mention snuggling up with Jeremy to keep warm. The very thought makes me feel a bit sick.” – Richard Hammond

But it seems that being crushed in your sleep by a large snoring orangutang wasn’t the scariest moment one could have in the desert, it was the unexpected drops of the dunes in the desert that had Hammond screaming.

“When you’re surrounded by sand, the landscape blends into one. And while a dune might look gentle going up, you don’t know what’s over the top. You do have to be very careful. Those dunes can surprise you. Unluckily for me, in what had to be the biggest disaster of the two-part special, the other side of one dune was a sheer drop. You’ll have to watch to see what actually happens, but it’s safe to say that I had a lucky escape.”

Here’s one of the drops we found in the montage shared in episode 1.

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The rest of the interview is really great, so you should definitely check it out. You can sense the real adventures the boys have with the crew and can only imagine the camaraderie that can develop through those kind of experiences.