NEW YORK (AP) — A flight attendant who was still strapped into her seat survived a fall from an Air Canada plane that collided with a fire truck at New York’s LaGuardia Airport, her daughter said Monday.
Sarah Lepine told Canadian news station TVA Nouvelles it was a “complete miracle.”
She said her mother, Solange Tremblay, suffered multiple fractures in one of her legs and required surgery but was otherwise fine. An aviation safety expert said she may have been helped by sitting in a four-point restraint seat used by crew members.
“I’m still trying to understand how this happened,” Lepine said, “but she definitely had a guardian angel watching over her.”
The plane, carrying more than 70 passengers, collided with a fire truck that was dealing with another plane as it was landing on Sunday night. The nose of the Air Canada plane was destroyed, killing the pilot and co-pilot.
Aviation safety expert Jeff Guzzetti also called Tremblay’s survival a miracle “compared to the destruction of the plane’s nose.”
“The flight attendant’s seat is a convertible seat that folds up and is bolted to the wall, and the same wall is used in the cockpit,” said Guzzetti, a former federal accident investigator.
“It’s a very solid seat,” he added. “It’s designed to withstand more crash loads than a passenger seat because you need flight attendants to help passengers exit the plane after a crash.”
In 2013, an Asiana Airlines flight crashed into a seawall while landing at San Francisco International Airport, injuring at least two flight attendants who were thrown from the plane. Asiana Airlines Flight 214 carried 291 people, including three girls.
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White reported from Detroit. Associated Press reporter Rebecca Boone in Boise, Idaho, contributed to this report.