Latest news with #Koukov
CNN
17-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CNN
He was lucky enough to survive the Toronto plane crash. His experience as a skier helped him film it
Pete Koukov says that when his flight from Minneapolis was about to touch down in Toronto, everything seemed fine. And then just like that, he thought he was going to die. Koukov was one of the 80 people who walked away from the wreckage of February's Delta Flight 4819. It was his extraordinary video that revealed to the world just how devastating the crash had been and how lucky all the passengers were to survive. At least 244 million people on Instagram have watched the clip, watching him clamber out of the plane, stepping down onto the snowy runway and turning to reveal the inverted fuselage that had been shorn of both wings. 'Holy f**k!' he exclaims in the video, 'Oh my f**king God. Yo, I was just on this f**king plane!' As a professional content creator, Koukov said that the decision to film his experience came to him instinctively and, as a skier, it just so happens that he's very familiar with high-risk situations. 'I was almost the best person to be taking a video in that situation,' he told CNN Sports, apologizing for his choice of words heard on the video. 'Because we film each other all the time, you get really good at it when your hands are cold, you get pretty good at pulling (the camera) out quick. Although I was in a very stressful situation, it wasn't anything that I knew I wasn't able to do, and I knew this was an insane event in my life and I made sure there was a recording of it.' It was only when he saw the exterior of the plane that he felt as though he was safe. 'There were moments of 'Are we going to blow up? Is there going to be a fire?' Until I was off the plane, that's when it was like 'OK, I can breathe,'' he said. Koukov is no stranger to finding himself in tight spots or being upside down. His social media feed shows him street skiing, a niche genre that is best described as a cross between skateboarding, parkour and alpine sports. He skis over urban structures and through tiny gaps that are in his path. In 2023, he posted a video of him skiing down the steep side of a church building in South Dakota – he wrote that climbing up it was 'the scariest thing I'll ever do.' Those experiences have led him to be a sort of jack-of-all-trades when it comes to content creation. 'Skiing is such like a niche and it's so small that you kind of do – even if you're an athlete – you kind of do more than just being an athlete, whether it's filming, editing, producing, directing,' he told CNN. 'You kind of learn how to do it all, and it's always something I've really enjoyed and wanted to do more outside of skiing.' While he wouldn't quite describe himself as an adrenaline junkie, he admits that he's attracted to recreational risks – 'and that's what kind of makes it fun.' But now that he's starred in the ultimate adrenaline video, he can't quite reconcile his role in it. 'It almost feels like a separate world,' he explained, detailing his experience of watching another video of the crash-landing on the runway. 'I'll even see the side-view perspective and it's really hard for me to put myself (there) and be, like, 'I was actually on that plane.' 'It doesn't really translate. It doesn't really make sense to me. It was hard to believe while it was happening, and it's even hard to believe now.' Koukov was heading to Toronto on a one-way ticket to shoot content for the skiing magazine Browser, but a back injury sustained in the accident means he's been advised to stay off his skis for a while. He doesn't anticipate that the crash will change his approach to skiing or its inherent risks, but he admits that flying will never be the same again. 'I travel a lot for skiing,' he said, 'And I don't think I'll ever be able to feel the same again, that's for sure.' Because he couldn't ski in Toronto, Koukov made the decision to quickly return home to Denver, a decision that he believes made it easier to face his fears because it didn't leave him any time to let the experience sink in. 'If I had waited the original three weeks, I think maybe it would have been worse,' he said. But perhaps he's already equipped to cope with the mental trauma of his experience. Koukov has been embracing risky sports like skiing and mountain biking since he was young. 'It's a challenge to overcome something, that's why we do it. You land something you didn't necessarily think you could do, and nothing really beats that feeling. It's good to scare yourself!' he said. In 1898, the former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill wrote an oft-quoted line, 'Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result.' Koukov told CNN Sports he hadn't heard the quote before, but after musing on it for a moment, he put the sentiment into his own words. 'It's a pretty neat feeling to feel like I should have died and didn't. I don't know if it's necessarily a good feeling or not. It's a grateful feeling,' he said. 'I'm not saying that the tricks I do on skis are deadly by any means, but there's always consequence, and I've always kind of gravitated towards the fact that there's consequence, and that's what makes it enjoyable.'
CNN
17-03-2025
- Entertainment
- CNN
He was lucky enough to survive the Toronto plane crash. His experience as a skier helped him film it
Pete Koukov says that when his flight from Minneapolis was about to touch down in Toronto, everything seemed fine. And then just like that, he thought he was going to die. Koukov was one of the 80 people who walked away from the wreckage of February's Delta Flight 4819. It was his extraordinary video that revealed to the world just how devastating the crash had been and how lucky all the passengers were to survive. At least 244 million people on Instagram have watched the clip, watching him clamber out of the plane, stepping down onto the snowy runway and turning to reveal the inverted fuselage that had been shorn of both wings. 'Holy f**k!' he exclaims in the video, 'Oh my f**king God. Yo, I was just on this f**king plane!' As a professional content creator, Koukov said that the decision to film his experience came to him instinctively and, as a skier, it just so happens that he's very familiar with high-risk situations. 'I was almost the best person to be taking a video in that situation,' he told CNN Sports, apologizing for his choice of words heard on the video. 'Because we film each other all the time, you get really good at it when your hands are cold, you get pretty good at pulling (the camera) out quick. Although I was in a very stressful situation, it wasn't anything that I knew I wasn't able to do, and I knew this was an insane event in my life and I made sure there was a recording of it.' It was only when he saw the exterior of the plane that he felt as though he was safe. 'There were moments of 'Are we going to blow up? Is there going to be a fire?' Until I was off the plane, that's when it was like 'OK, I can breathe,'' he said. Koukov is no stranger to finding himself in tight spots or being upside down. His social media feed shows him street skiing, a niche genre that is best described as a cross between skateboarding, parkour and alpine sports. He skis over urban structures and through tiny gaps that are in his path. In 2023, he posted a video of him skiing down the steep side of a church building in South Dakota – he wrote that climbing up it was 'the scariest thing I'll ever do.' Those experiences have led him to be a sort of jack-of-all-trades when it comes to content creation. 'Skiing is such like a niche and it's so small that you kind of do – even if you're an athlete – you kind of do more than just being an athlete, whether it's filming, editing, producing, directing,' he told CNN. 'You kind of learn how to do it all, and it's always something I've really enjoyed and wanted to do more outside of skiing.' While he wouldn't quite describe himself as an adrenaline junkie, he admits that he's attracted to recreational risks – 'and that's what kind of makes it fun.' But now that he's starred in the ultimate adrenaline video, he can't quite reconcile his role in it. 'It almost feels like a separate world,' he explained, detailing his experience of watching another video of the crash-landing on the runway. 'I'll even see the side-view perspective and it's really hard for me to put myself (there) and be, like, 'I was actually on that plane.' 'It doesn't really translate. It doesn't really make sense to me. It was hard to believe while it was happening, and it's even hard to believe now.' Koukov was heading to Toronto on a one-way ticket to shoot content for the skiing magazine Browser, but a back injury sustained in the accident means he's been advised to stay off his skis for a while. He doesn't anticipate that the crash will change his approach to skiing or its inherent risks, but he admits that flying will never be the same again. 'I travel a lot for skiing,' he said, 'And I don't think I'll ever be able to feel the same again, that's for sure.' Because he couldn't ski in Toronto, Koukov made the decision to quickly return home to Denver, a decision that he believes made it easier to face his fears because it didn't leave him any time to let the experience sink in. 'If I had waited the original three weeks, I think maybe it would have been worse,' he said. But perhaps he's already equipped to cope with the mental trauma of his experience. Koukov has been embracing risky sports like skiing and mountain biking since he was young. 'It's a challenge to overcome something, that's why we do it. You land something you didn't necessarily think you could do, and nothing really beats that feeling. It's good to scare yourself!' he said. In 1898, the former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill wrote an oft-quoted line, 'Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result.' Koukov told CNN Sports he hadn't heard the quote before, but after musing on it for a moment, he put the sentiment into his own words. 'It's a pretty neat feeling to feel like I should have died and didn't. I don't know if it's necessarily a good feeling or not. It's a grateful feeling,' he said. 'I'm not saying that the tricks I do on skis are deadly by any means, but there's always consequence, and I've always kind of gravitated towards the fact that there's consequence, and that's what makes it enjoyable.'
Boston Globe
19-02-2025
- General
- Boston Globe
A passenger jet flips and burns, but tragedy is averted this time
Advertisement As investigators from safety boards in Canada and the United States, as well as the regional jet's manufacturer, began combing over the wreckage, there was no official word on what caused the crash. For the 80 people on board the flight from Minneapolis, the world lurched immediately after the wheels hit the ground on Monday afternoon. In the blink of an eye, passengers found themselves hanging upside down, still strapped into their seats as jet fuel ran down the windows, said Pete Carlson, one of the passengers. 'The absolute initial feeling is just, 'Need to get out of this,'' Carlson told CBC, the Canadian public broadcaster. But after a horrific string of fatal aviation accidents over the past two months, this crash proved different. The seat belts that passengers had strapped on to prepare for landing likely contributed to the lack of a more catastrophic outcome, aviation experts said. Flight attendants and passengers were able to help each other out of the emergency exits and, with the assistance of firefighters, onto the snowy runway. Delta said that 21 passengers were transported to local hospitals after the crash, as of Monday night. By Tuesday morning, all but two had been released, the airline said. Cory Tkatch, commander of operations at the Peel Regional Paramedic Services, said that the injured passengers suffered 'back sprains, head injuries, anxiety, some headaches, nausea and vomiting due to the fuel exposure.' Advertisement The crew of an air ambulance waiting to take off captured the moment of the crash-landing on film. The video, which spread on social media and was verified by The New York Times, may offer clues about what caused the plane to end up flipped over on its back. Fox Flight, a Canadian air ambulance company based in Toronto, told the Times that the video had been filmed from one of its aircraft. The jet, a Bombardier CRJ900 operated by a Delta subsidiary, Endeavor Air, was landing at 2:15 p.m. Eastern time after a seemingly normal flight along the busy route between Minneapolis and Toronto. 'The second that the wheels hit the ground, then everything happened,' said Pete Koukov, a professional skier from Colorado who was on the flight, in an interview Monday night. 'The next thing I know, we're sideways.' The plane skidded on its right side, said Koukov, who was sitting at a window seat on the other side of the plane. He saw sparks and flames as the plane hit the ground. When the plane came to a stop belly-up, he unbuckled and lowered himself down to the ceiling of the aircraft, which was now its floor, Koukov said. 'People were panicking.' A video taken by Koukov shows a flight attendant helping passengers climb out of the plane, urging them to hurry and to leave their belongings behind. Other videos from the scene showed flames and black smoke billowing from the plane as firefighters hosed it down. Photos taken after the crash showed most of the right wing of the jet shorn off, and the left wing damaged with the left landing gear still attached to the plane. Advertisement The Transportation Safety Board of Canada will lead the investigation into the crash, officials have said, and the National Transportation Safety Board has said it was leading a team of American investigators to assist the Canadian authorities. The ability of the crew to open the jet's doors, even while upside down and get passengers out quickly, was a testament to their training, according to aviation safety experts. Carlson, who had a scrape visible on his head, said he saw a woman who had ended up under a seat and a mother and a boy who were sitting on the ceiling of the aircraft. He had no idea what state any of them were in, he said. 'My fatherly instinct and background as a paramedic kind of kicked in,' he said, making him focus on ensuring that they all got off the plane. Even in those panicky moments, there was a palpable camaraderie as they escaped the plane, he said. 'Everyone on that plane suddenly became very close in terms of how to help one another, how to console one another,' he said. 'That was powerful.' Jet fuel was running down the airplane's windows, Carlson said. And after leaving the plane, he and others tried to move as far from it as possible once he noticed that a wing was missing and heard sounds of an explosion. Emerging from the upside-down plane, onto the tarmac and into the blowing snow Monday, Carlson said, 'it felt like I was stepping onto the tundra.' Advertisement 'I didn't care how cold it was,' he said. 'I didn't care how far I had to walk, how long I had to stand. All of us wanted to just be out of the aircraft.' This article originally appeared in
Yahoo
18-02-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Toronto plane crash survivor describes 'mayhem' after terrified passengers hung upside down on Delta jet
A passenger from the Delta Air Lines plane that crashed in Toronto recalled the harrowing moment the aircraft hit the runway and flipped over, propelling passengers into the air while they hung from their seat belts. Peter Koukov, who was traveling from Denver to Toronto on Monday, caught the moments after the crash-landing on camera as passengers de-boarded the aircraft. He joined "America's Newsroom" to discuss the the harrowing incident. Toronto Plane Crash Timeline: Delta Flight From Minneapolis Flips Upside Down While Attempting To Land "Basically, we hit the ground and kind of just bounced up and turned on our side and were sliding on our side for a while," Koukov told Dana Perino on Tuesday. "Honestly, not as long as I thought we were going to slide for, and then we ended up upside down and we were… hanging by our seat belts upside down for a second." "We made it off safely," he continued. "Everyone is alive, thankfully." The CRJ-900 jet, which was bound for Toronto Pearson International Airport, had departed from Minneapolis/St. Paul International Airport on Monday. Read On The Fox News App The Federal Aviation Administration said all 80 people aboard the jet were evacuated, as images also showed the aircraft belly up in the snow at Toronto's airport. Before the crash, high winds and drifting snow reportedly had already prompted flight delays and cancelations at Pearson. "There was no warning from the pilot," Koukov said. "There was no… physical warning either. I didn't feel like anything was wrong until kind of just like the second the wheels touched the ground… It all kind of went mayhem from there." Air traffic control audio released after the crash depicts officials describing how the plane was "ups-side-down and burning" on the tarmac. Plane Crashes Spark Renewed Fear Of Flying: 10 Causes Of Aviation Disasters Delta Air Lines said "18 customers with injuries" had been transported to area hospitals. At least three people suffered critical but not life-threatening injuries, a spokesperson for the paramedic service that was on scene told Fox News Digital. Two patients were taken by air ambulance to two different trauma centers – Sunnybrook Health Sciences Center and St. Michael's Hospital – in Toronto. A child, about four years old, was transported to The Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto. "You're kind of just hanging suspended," Koukov said. "Me and that girl next to me were… able to get out pretty quickly and kind of like climb… sort of fall down to the ground, which was in the ceiling. And then other people kind of needed some help and people were sort of falling. But I don't think anyone… was hurt by getting down from their seat belts." The cause of the crash remains under investigation. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is expected to take the lead. "The hearts of the entire global Delta family are with those affected by today's incident at Toronto-Pearson International Airport," Delta CEO Ed Bastian said in a statement. "I want to express my thanks to the many Delta and Endeavor team members and the first responders on site. We are working to confirm the details and will share the most current information on as soon as it becomes available. In the meantime, please take care and stay safe." Fox News' Danielle Wallace, Sarah Rumpf-Whitten and the Associated Press contributed to this report. Original article source: Toronto plane crash survivor describes 'mayhem' after terrified passengers hung upside down on Delta jet
Yahoo
18-02-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Jaw-Dropping Footage Shows Passengers ‘Hanging Like Bats' in Crashed Delta Jet
Footage emerged Tuesday of passengers 'hanging upside down like bats' inside the Delta Air Lines jet that flipped upon landing in Toronto the day before. The jaw-dropping clip, recorded by a passenger who was inverted himself, shows a shockingly calm cabin—save for some muffled shouts—with survivors typing on their phones as they dangled in the air, possibly still in shock about what had happened. 'We hit the ground and we were sideways, and then we were hanging upside down like bats,' Peter Koukov told ABC News. 'It all happened pretty, pretty fast.' Koukov said some passengers dangled helplessly until rescuers arrived to safely bring them down. His own recording showed the flight crew ushering those who were able to get down safely off the Bombardier CRJ-900 that had taken off from Minneapolis. Pete Carlson, another passenger, said he was also shocked with how quickly the dramatic scene played out. 'The one minute you're landing and kind of waiting to see your friends and your people and the next minute you're physically upside down and just really turned around,' he told ABC. John Nelson, a third passenger, said many on board opted to calmly dangle from their seats at first because the flight crew instructed them to. Passengers took matters into their own hands not long after, he said, adding that he helped bring down those around him after he undid his seatbelt and plopped onto the plane's ceiling, which had become its floor. 'You heard the flight attendants yelling, 'Open the door. Everybody, take your stuff and get out now,'' he recounted to ABC. 'We all worked together and got out of there as quickly as we could.' There were 80 people on board the flight, including its 76 passengers—of which 22 were Canadian nationals—and four flight crew. Perhaps miraculously, there were no fatalities in the crash. However, three people—a child, a man in his 60s, and a woman in her 40s—were rushed to a hospital in critical condition, officials said. A total of 21 passengers required hospitalization, the airline later said, but all but two had been released by Tuesday morning. A definitive cause for the crash is yet to be identified by authorities. Pilots and aviation experts have noted the jet appeared to make a hard landing before it was stripped of one wing and overturned in a fireball. An air traffic control recording said the aircraft was being battered by winds as fierce as 40 mph before landing—part of a nasty winter storm sweeping across the region. While some reports described the runway as 'icy' with winds gusting to 70 mph at landing, the airport's fire chief, Todd Aitken, told reporters the surface was actually 'dry' and 'there was no crosswind conditions' at landing. Despite being on foreign soil, the crash is sure to put pressure on Donald Trump's administration. It's the fourth high-profile aviation crash involving American planes within his first month back in office—a period that has been particularly tumultuous within the Federal Aviation Administration. About 400 termination emails went out to FAA staffers on Friday as part of Trump's far-reaching cuts to the federal government's workforce and overall spending. The timing of the firings has left many scratching their heads, as it comes on the heels of the midair collision of a U.S. Army helicopter and American Airlines jet on Jan. 29 that killed 67; a medical transport plane crashing in Philadelphia that killed six; and the Bering Air passenger flight that crashed in Alaska on Feb. 6 and killed 10.
