News that 1 man survived the Air India plane crash weighs on some other sole survivors

Toronto Star

2 days ago

News of the sole survivor of an Air India plane crash that killed the other 241 people aboard has led to endless online fascination, but it has also stirred up painful feelings for a handful of others who have had similar fates.
Tens of thousands of people have searched for details about Vishwashkumar Ramesh since Thursday's crash, according to Google Trends. People have commented on social media that the idea seems unreal, remarkable, a work of divine intervention, and a miracle.
But it has happened more than a dozen times before.
George Lamson Jr., who was the lone survivor of a Galaxy Airlines crash more than 40 years ago, said such stories always deeply affect him.
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Surviving the Air India crash
Ramesh told India's national broadcaster that he still can't believe he's alive after his brother and more than 200 others died in the crash.
He said the aircraft seemed to become stuck immediately after takeoff. The lights then came on, he said, and right after that it accelerated but seemed unable to gain height before it crashed.
He said the side of the plane where he was seated fell onto the ground floor of a building and there was space for him to escape after the door broke open. He unfastened his seat belt and forced himself out of the plane.
'When I opened my eyes, I realized I was alive,' he said.
Surviving leaves 'a lasting echo'
Lamson, who was a 17-year-old from Plymouth, Minnesota, when he survived the Galaxy crash in Reno in 1985, didn't respond to messages from The Associated Press this week.
But he has talked about his feelings on social media and in the 2013 'Sole Survivor' documentary that focused on him and 13 other sole survivors of major airline crashes.
Lamson posted Thursday that he stays in touch with other sole survivors and he finds that 'there's an unspoken understanding, and it's been comforting.'
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'My heart goes out to the survivor in India and to all the families waking up to loss today,' Lamson wrote. 'There are no right words for moments like this, but I wanted to acknowledge it. These events don't just make headlines. They leave a lasting echo in the lives of those who've lived through something similar.'
A pilot with survivor's guilt
Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky. When his wife told him that everyone else on the plane died, Polehinke wept.
'My first concern was the passengers that were my responsibility that day,' he said in the 'Sole Survivor' documentary.
Adding to the survivor's guilt is the fact that the airline announced in the aftermath of the crash that Polehinke and the pilot violated policy by having an extended personal conversation when they were supposed to be focused on the flight.
But one of the investigators of that crash told the filmmakers that the pilots' personal conversation likely had nothing to do with the crash, and everyone told investigators that Polehinke and the pilot were highly competent professionals.
But the accident still haunts Polehinke, who now uses a wheelchair to get around.
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'I don't think there'll ever by a time that maybe I can forgive myself,' he said. 'I just hope that God can give the family members, some comfort, some peace and some compassion, so their burden gets less as time goes on.'
'The right place at the right time'
Cecilia Crocker doesn't just carry the marks of the 1987 crash she survived on her heart and in the scars on her arms, legs and forehead. She also got an airplane tattoo on her wrist.
Crocker, who was known as Cecilia Cichan at the time of the crash, said in the documentary that she thought about the crash every day.
'I got this tattoo as a reminder of where I've come from. I see it as — so many scars were put on my body against my will — and I decided to put this on my body for myself,' she said. 'I think that me surviving was random. I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.'
But Lamson said in the documentary that he doesn't believe in random chance and can't shake the feeling that 'my life was spared for a reason either I wanted or something a higher power than me wanted.'
Crocker was 4 years old when she flew on Northwest Airlines Flight 255 and it crashed in the Detroit suburb of Romulus, killing 154 people on board, including her parents and brother. Two people also died on the ground.
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The Phoenix-bound McDonnell Douglas MD80 was clearing the runway when it tilted and the left wing clipped a light pole before shearing the top off a rental car building.
The National Transportation Safety Board concluded the plane's crew failed to set the wing flaps properly for takeoff. The agency also said a cockpit warning system did not alert the crew to the problem.
Aviation experts have said that video of the Air India crash raises questions about whether the flaps were set properly this time.
Investigators have recovered the plane's flight data recorder, but they have not yet determined what may have caused the crash.