From the time I was a child I knew that I wanted to be a flight attendant. Being in an aviation family, I was raised on airplanes. In my mind it was a glamorous position, exciting and adventuresome, it still is. But there came a time in my training with TWA that I questioned whether or not I wanted to do this career. It does carry a great deal of responsibility with it. The true purpose of flight attendants is rarely seen, and that’s a good thing. In this article I will cover flight attendant crews who were challenged to use their training to save lives. They faced their biggest fears, and they did it successfully. My goal is not to scare anyone away from the career as a flight attendant, but to instill a sense of pride and responsibility of how important this, often overlooked and underestimated, position is.
TWA 843
TWA flight 843 was a Lockheed L1011, an aircraft which I worked several times in my career with TWA. Flight 843 was a scheduled flight from New York’s JFK Airport to SFO International Airport. Flight 843 crashed on takeoff. The passengers and crew were successfully evacuated without one loss of life. A miracle in itself as only half of the exits were usable and a majority of passengers were non-English speaking. Faced with these seemingly insurmountable obstacles, the crew’s training kicked in and the evacuation was a success..
Here is the debrief/interview with the crew of flight 843. Please listen carefully and notice how they attribute their training to the success of their evacuation.
TWA 843 Crew Pt. 1: https://youtu.be/syw_cYYhrZ4
TWA 843 Crew Pt. 2: https://youtu.be/7wu-aybTbxA
TWA 843 Crew Pt. 3: https://youtu.be/IBKZr5xDcZY
When I first watched this video in my initial training at TWA I was nervous. The true nature of the job that I had dreamed about was hitting a nerve that I had always pushed to the back of my mind. Now it was being brought to the forefront. After the conclusion, I was filled with a sense of pride. These were my co-workers, fellow flight attendants who were called into action and did it without fail. When faced with the circumstances of fire and blocked exits, a full flight, non-English speaking passengers, they successfully evacuated and saved the lives of every person on that airplane. My determination was tenfold as I too wanted to be among the chosen few that are trained to do this phenomenal career.
ASA Flight 529
ASA (Atlantic Southeast Airlines) flight 529 was an Embraer EMB 120 Brasilia aircraft that crashed near Carrolton, GA on August 21, 1995. Nine of the 29 passengers and crew on board were killed as a result of the accident. When faced with imminent danger, the flight attendant was able to pull herself together and continue to do the duties she was trained to do. In this video clip you can hear the commentator say that she was operating on auto-pilot. This is why training and recurrent training is so imperative. When something goes wrong, that part of initial training kicks in and allows you to have a fighting chance of surviving and preparing your passengers.
ASA 529 Crew and Passenger Accounts: https://youtu.be/iCfOnYEKRj4
ASA 529 Wikipedia Article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlantic_Southeast_Airlines_Flight_529
Robin did an amazing job and helped evacuate her passengers under the worst of circumstances. Having been in her situation myself, I can truly say that the emotions get to you at first, but then your training does kick in and is what can save your life and the lives of your passengers.
TWA Flight 847
Trans World Airlines Flight 847 was a flight from Cairo to San Diego with en route stops in Athens, Rome, Boston, and Los Angeles. On the morning of June 14, 1985, Flight 847 was hijacked shortly after take off from Athens. The hijackers demanded the release of 700 Shia Muslims from Israeli custody and took the plane repeatedly to Beirut and Algiers. The crew in Athens were Captain John Testrake, First Officer Phil Maresca, Flight Engineer Christian Zimmerman, flight service manager Uli Derickson, and flight attendants Judy Cox, Hazel Hesp, Elizabeth Howes, and Helen Sheahan.
Flight Service Manager (Purser) Uli Derickson is credited with maintaining calm in the cabin and keeping the hijackers at bay, doing her best to save the lives of all of her passengers, and even using her own credit card to pay over $5000 for fuel for the airplane. Captain John Testrake was the Capatain and went through horrific moments of having a gun held to his head. The entire crew was amazing and remained professional throughout the ordeal.
TWA 847 ABC News 17 Days of Terror: https://youtu.be/fkdKadG6cHI
The Uli Derickson Story (Movie): https://youtu.be/bRePvBWWatE
Uli Derickson Article: https://allthatsinteresting.com/uli-derickson-twa-flight-847
Conclusion
I hope that this article has brought to the forefront the importance of this amazing career. 99.99% of flight attendants will never face an adverse situation as grave as these examples. Since the events of 9/11 and in today’s pandemic world, air travel has become a bit more stressful due to the increased security measures and the current mask mandates. As flight attendants, it is important to keep our emotions in check, even on our long days, so that we can maintain calm in the cabin, be prepared for anything that may come up, and jump into action when needed.
I will be doing more articles like this one in the future and will also share with you my own story of evacuating a flight. As flight attendants, we are the eyes and ears in the cabin. We are the firefighters, caregivers, therapists, hand-holders, comforters, teachers and security specialists that are there for the sole purpose of our passengers safety. The amount of “hats” we wear are invisible to most, and that’s the way we always want it to be.
Jason.
