PASSENGERS ON A SOUTHWEST AIRLINES FLIGHT THAT BLEW AN ENGINE AND BROKE A WINDOW AT 32,000 FEET SCRAMBLED TO TRY TO SAVE A WOMAN FROM BEING SUCKED OUT OF THE PLANE. SHE DIED, SEVEN OTHERS WERE HURT.
Plane passengers scrambled to try to save a woman being sucked out of a broken window after a jet engine exploded at 32,000 feet and sent shrapnel into the aircraft.
Passengers dragged the woman back in as the sudden decompression of the cabin pulled her part way through the opening, but she was gravely injured. She later died, and seven others were injured.
The Southwest Airlines flight from New York to Dallas was forced to make an emergency landing at Philadelphia on Tuesday.
The Boeing 737-700 was travelling at 32,500 feet when the engine on the left side of the plane exploded about 20 minutes after leaving LaGuardia airport.
“The plane dropped immediately,” Matt Tranchin, who was sitting three rows behind the broken window told Philadelphia’s NBC10 news. “Plane smelled like smoke. Ash was all around us.”
NBC10 said another passenger, Eric Zilbert, reported that “several heroic gentlemen” pulled the woman back into the plane and immediately performed CPR. Tranchin said she was covered in blood.
Marty Martinez, another passenger, was a few rows behind the rescued woman.
Other passengers were grabbing anything they could lay their hands on — jackets and coats — to stuff into the broken window.
“A man was helping — there was blood all over him. She made no noise at all. I could see the blood all over that gentleman’s hands,” Martinez said.
Philadelphia Fire Commissioner Adam Thiel said at a news conference that seven other people on board the plane suffered minor injuries, but none of them were transported to the hospital.
“It’s our understanding that the passengers on board the aircraft, in addition to the flight crew and the cabin crew, did some pretty amazing things under very difficult circumstances,” he said.
The midflight engine failure terrified passengers, who posted photos and footage showing oxygen masks deployed and at least one blown out window.
Martinez streamed video to Facebook Live as he put on an oxygen mask, telling a local news station the plane’s WiFi had just been activated when the incident occurred.
Martinez’s Facebook Live video included a chilling caption.
“Something is wrong with our plane! It appears we are going down! Emergency landing!! Southwest flight from NYC to Dallas!!”
He sent a text to friends and colleagues: “I want you to know that I love you all and thank you for all that you’ve done. I’m so sorry!! Planes going down. I love you guys!”
Cheers broke out as the plane landed safely.