One Star Trek Explosion Plagued William Shatner With A Lifelong Hearing Issue
Even non-Trekkies likely know the "Star Trek" episode "Arena" (first aired January 19, 1967). That's the episode wherein Captain Kirk (William Shatner) is chosen by a godlike alien species to go to Vasquez Rocks in California — I mean a distant alien world called Cestus III — to fight a lizard-like alien called a Gorn. The Gorn captain was voiced by Ted Cassidy and played by stunt performers Bobby Clark, Gary Combs, and Bill Blackburn. The fight between Kirk and the Gorn is notoriously cheesy, with the two performers making awkward and slow movements that are about as thrilling as watching two people wrestle with shopping carts at their local grocery store.
In order to best the Gorn in combat, Kirk must employ some long-forgotten geological knowledge, creating flash powder and explosions from compounds in the local rocks. He constructs a rudimentary mortar cannon out of a bamboo shoot and manages to blast his foe with loose diamond pebbles he finds on the ground — a clever solution that nearly kills the Gorn. Kirk, luckily, keeps his wits about him and doesn't move in to murder his foe, shouting instead that he will not be forced to deal a death blow by some faraway aliens who are clearly manipulating him and his reptilian counterpart.
Ever since that episode, Shatner has suffered a mild case of tinnitus. Evidently, being right next to a mini mortar explosion is enough to leave one's ears permanently damaged. Tinnitus, for those unfamiliar, is a persistent ringing in the ears, usually brought on by disease or injury. Shatner has gone on the record about his tinnitus, a condition that, in his old age, has become chronic.
'There were days when I didn't know whether I would survive the agony'
In a 2008 video Shatner filmed for the American Tinnitus Association, he noted the accident, saying:
"My tinnitus began while I was filming the 'Star Trek' episode 'Arena.' I was standing too close to a special effects explosion and in resulted in tinnitus. There were days when I didn't know whether I would survive the agony, I was so tormented by the screeching in my head. I realized that I wouldn't be able to go on. But then a ray of light burst into my life the American Tinnitus Association. The help they gave me literally saved my life."
Shatner remained active in tinnitus charities for years. In 2016, he spoke with the Aquarian and talked about using habituation, a psychological technique that involves becoming accustomed to certain symptoms so that they become less present and more tolerable. Thanks to the ATA video, Shatner even said he was able to talk to a "famous musician" about the effects, and how much he's been able to weather his condition:
"A famous musician got a hold of me cold. I didn't know him. He knew I got it because I was the official spokesman for tinnitus at one period, and I talked him down and encouraged him to do a habituation, you know, the white sound, because when I was asked when I first got it how it affected my life from 1 to 10, it was 9 1/2. Now I don't hear it except when you and I are talking about it."
A now-unavailable 1996 appearance on "Late Night with David Letterman" revealed that not only did Shatner receive some hearing damage on the set of "Arena," but so too did Leonard Nimoy. Explosions, it seems, are very, very, very loud.