Panama

Survivor: Panama · Season 12

Episode Guide

How Survivor: Panama unfolded, week by week.

  1. 1“The First Exile”Feb 2, 2006Sixteen players arrive in Panama split into four small tribes by age and sex, and Probst debuts a twist that will reshape the game for years to come: Exile Island, where a banished castaway is marooned alone between challenges. The older women's tribe stumbles first, and Tina Scheer, a tough lumberjack-sports competitor, is voted out as the very first boot.
  2. 2“Breakdown”Feb 9, 2006The four tribes are quickly reorganized by schoolyard pick into two mixed tribes, La Mina and Casaya, and the chaotic Casaya is a mess from the jump. When they drop immunity, Melinda Hyder is the one sent home.
  3. 3“Crazy Fights, Snake Dinners”Feb 16, 2006Casaya's dysfunction deepens, the camp loud with arguments and Shane Powers' cold-turkey nicotine withdrawal fraying everyone's nerves. The tribe loses another challenge and votes out Misty Giles.
  4. 4“Starvation and Lunacy”Feb 23, 2006Hungry and frazzled, Casaya keeps losing and keeps bickering. Ruth Marie Milliman, quiet and stranded on the outs of the chaotic tribe, is the next to go.
  5. 5“For Cod's Sake”Mar 2, 2006La Mina finally hits Tribal, and the steadier tribe trims a weaker link. Bobby Mason is voted out as the group sorts out its pecking order.
  6. 6“Salvation and Desertion”Mar 9, 2006Another La Mina trip to Tribal, and Dan Barry, the former NASA astronaut, ends up the odd man out, voted off as the tribe lines harden heading toward the merge.
  7. 7“An Emerging Plan”Mar 30, 2006The tribes merge into Gitanos, and Casaya walks in holding a six-to-four edge over La Mina. They press it at once, voting out La Mina's Nick Stanbury as the picking-off of the rival tribe begins. Terry Deitz, though, is sitting on a secret: banished to Exile again and again, he's dug up the hidden immunity idol.
  8. 8“The Power of the Idol”Apr 6, 2006Casaya keeps working through La Mina, and Austin Carty is the next to fall, voted out as the first member of the jury. Terry, idol in his pocket and immunity threat that he is, keeps surviving while his old allies drop around him.
  9. 9“Fight for Your Life or Eat”Apr 13, 2006The La Mina cleanup rolls on. Sally Schumann, the last of Terry's allies, can't escape the Casaya numbers and is voted out to the jury, leaving Terry Deitz completely alone against the six-strong Casaya bloc.
  10. 10“Medical Emergency”Apr 20, 2006Terry's one-man stand gets a reprieve from an unexpected quarter. Bruce Kanegai, the stoic art teacher, is struck by a severe abdominal blockage, and medical is forced to pull him from the game, his torch snuffed without a vote. The medevac thins Casaya by one and buys Terry a little more time.
  11. 11“Perilous Scramble”Apr 27, 2006With La Mina down to just Terry, the Casaya alliance starts eyeing its own. Terry wins immunity again, as untouchable as ever, so the group turns inward and votes out Courtney Marit, the free-spirited dancer, sending her to the jury.
  12. 12“Bamboozled”May 4, 2006Shane Powers, the volatile, intense Casaya live wire who'd run hot all season, finally outlives his usefulness to the alliance. Terry's immunity run keeps him out of reach, so the others blindside Shane instead, voting him out to the jury and setting up a final four of Aras, Danielle, Cirie, and Terry.
  13. 13“Call the Whambulance!”May 11, 2006At the final four, Terry Deitz takes the immunity that matters once more, extending his remarkable run and forcing the others to turn on each other. The vote deadlocks, sending Cirie Fields and Danielle DiLorenzo to a fire-making tiebreaker. Cirie, the New Jersey nurse who'd grown from comic relief into one of the sharpest players of the season, loses the fire to Danielle and is sent to the jury in fourth, her brilliant debut just short of the end.
  14. 14“The Final Showdown”FinaleMay 14, 2006Finale night, and Terry Deitz's incredible run finally runs out. At the final three, Danielle DiLorenzo wins the immunity Terry couldn't, and rather than risk the well-respected Terry at the end, she votes him out in third, his hidden idol never once needed and now useless. That leaves Aras Baskauskas and Danielle at Final Tribal, where the jury rewards Aras's steady leadership of the Casaya alliance over Danielle's more combative path, crowning Aras the Sole Survivor 5-2.