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On March 22, 22-year-old Jack Cabot made an emergency landing on Air Canada flight AC8646.
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Cabot was thankful he was not seriously injured in the collision.
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Despite the crash, Cabot plans to fly again, believing it will help him overcome the trauma.
This article is based on a conversation with Jack Cabot, a 22-year-old student at Ithaca College. The following content has been edited for length and clarity.
On March 22, I returned to New York from a short spring break trip to Calgary. My connecting flight back was via Montreal.
There was some pretty serious turbulence in the air, but nothing crazy happened until the landing. That’s when all hell broke loose. The plane landed hard, and two or three seconds later, I heard a loud bang.
The plane went out of control and everyone was scared
When we boarded the flight to New York, everyone looked annoyed because the flight had been delayed several times. We were about two hours behind schedule.
As we landed, the aircraft began to turn rapidly to the right. It felt like a total loss of control. I bowed my head, folded my arms, and prayed. The screams continued. Everyone was scared and I was completely panicked.
When we finally stopped, I thought, “Okay, we’re still alive.” I looked around and saw a lot of people bleeding. One man’s entire face was slashed. It’s clear that a lot of people are hurting a lot.
I was sitting in the middle section of the plane, one row in front of the emergency exit. When I looked at the front of the plane, it seemed completely crumpled inward, like a wall of broken parts.
A woman behind me suggested we exit through the emergency exit. I didn’t think it would be good on the plane, so we lined up and set off one by one. It wasn’t a big plane, so we jumped on the wing and dropped 4 or 5 feet to the ground.
I feel grateful and lucky
After waiting for two or three minutes, the medical staff arrived. I only had a few scratches, but others were much worse. I feel so grateful and blessed.
After getting off the plane, we sat on the bus for three or four hours and waited in the lounge. They were counting the number of people there. I chose to speak to the police about what I had seen, and even though we landed around 11:30pm, I left the airport around 4:30am. After landing I texted my brother and he picked me up from the airport. I got home about an hour later and went straight to bed.
I still plan to fly
I’ll be a little reluctant next time I have to fly, but I’ll have to get over it. It would be shocking if something like this happened twice.
In order to recover from what happened, I thought I needed a few days of relaxation and some exposure therapy. In fact, I think more flying will help me overcome this problem.
Read the original article on Business Insider
