‘It dragged me under’: Steve Irwin’s best friend recalls Crocodile Hunter saving his life
Steve Irwin’s best friend Wes Mannion has paid tribute to the conservationist on the 20th anniversary of his death.
Mannion told Today on Friday morning that Irwin was the embodiment of “mateship,” revealing he saved his life a number of times out in the field.
Wes Mannion, Steve Irwins best friend, has paid tribute to the conservationist on the 20th anniversary of his death. Today
“He would do anything for you, he saved my life, he’d die for you, he’s not a fair-weather friend. Once you were his mate, you were his mate forever,” he said.
Mannion recalled the time Irwin saved his life after a salt water crocodile got hold of him.
“He literally saved my butt. I got nailed by a big salty, it ripped half my backend out. I was gone, right at the time when it was dragging me under the water, he dove on the crocodile, and he got it off me.”
In another incident, a cobra spit corrosive venom into Mannion’s right eye while the pair were in Africa.
“I’m screaming, ‘My eye’! Because (the venom) digests your eye… Steve grabs me, picks me up throws me in the lake, pulled my eye open and saved my right eye.
“He was just unbelievable, he was an unbelievable man, I was very, very lucky to spend time with him.”
He also recalled the first time the pair met, at Irwin’s family Zoo in Queensland, when Mannion was just 14 years old.
“Back then, it was just the Queensland reptile park, it was this little roadside zoo run by Steve, his mum and dad and his sister,” he explained.
“I walked in, I hear this noise – all of a sudden, I see Steve jumping on an alligator. Back then he wasn’t the crocodile hunter… he had a pair of footy shorts on, no shirt on, and he’s wrestling this alligator,”
“[I see him] jump over the fence I’m just thinking ‘Holy hell’. From then on we became best mates.”
Irwin’s legacy continues with his wife, Terri Irwin, and his children, Bindi and Robert Irwin. Instagram/@robertirwinphotography
He described Irwin, who was eight years older than him, as “his best mate and mentor.”
“He took me under his wing and we just became super close.”
Mannion added that he tries to remember Irwin “every day” rather than only on the anniversary of his death.
“A picture will come up on your phone, you just get that feeling… even listening to his voice, it gets me really happy, you can’t help but miss the bugger.”
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