Complete Incident report Of Juliane Koepcke The Teenager Girl Who Fell 10,000 Feet And struggled to survive in Jungle For 11 Days

After being the only survivor of a plane crash in Peru, Juliane Koepcke spent 11 days within the jungle clawing her way back to civilization.

Juliane Koepcke had no idea what was future for her when boarded LANSA Flight 508 on Christmas Eve in 1971. The 17-year-old was traveling together with her mother from Lima, Peru to the eastern city of Pucallpa to go to her father, who was working within the Amazonian Rainforest.

Juliane Koepcke was born in Lima on Oct. 10, 1954. Both of her parents were German zoologists who moved to Peru to review wildlife. She had received her highschool diploma the day before the flight and planned to review zoology like her parents.

The Crash Of LANSA Flight 508

The flight was meant to be an hour long. Seated in 19F, it had been a smooth ride until the clouds grew darker and turbulence got worse.

Suddenly, the plane was within the midst of a huge thunderstorm. At now , the plane was during a swirl of coal black clouds and flashes of lightning glistened through the windows. When a lightning bolt struck the motor, the plane broke into pieces.

Then everything sped up. “What really happened are some things you'll only attempt to reconstruct in your mind,” said Koepcke. there have been the noises of people’s screams and therefore the motor until all she could hear was the wind in her ears.

Still strapped to her seat, Koepcke had only realized she was free-falling for a couple of moments before she lost consciousness.

She fell 10,000 feet down into the center of the Peruvian rainforest.

Juliane Koepcke Somehow Survives a ten ,000 Feet Fall

Juliane Koepcke had a broken collarbone and deep gash on her calf. But somehow she was alive. and she or he would spend subsequent 11 days struggling to remain alive.

When she awoke subsequent morning, the concussion in conjunction with the shock only allowed for her to process basic facts. She had survived a plane crash. She couldn’t see alright out of 1 eye. Then she slipped back to unconsciousness. It took half each day for Koepcke to completely rise up .

She began to seek out her mother but was she was unsuccessful. After she was rescued, she learned that her mother had also survived the initial fall, but soon died from her injuries.

In the midst of trying to find her mother, Koepcke had encounter alittle well.

She was feeling rather hopeless at now , on the other hand she remembered some survival advice given to her by her father: if you see water, follow it downstream. That’s where civilization is. “A small stream will flow into a much bigger one then into a much bigger one and a good bigger one, and eventually you’ll run into help.”

So began her journey down the stream. sometimes she walked, sometimes she swam. On the fourth day of her trek, she found three fellow passengers still strapped to their seats. They were all dead; one among them was a lady . Koepcke poked at the lady thinking it might be her mother but it wasn’t. Amongst the passengers was a bag of sweets. it might function her only food source for the remainder of her days within the forest.

It was around this point that Koepcke heard and saw rescue planes and helicopters above, yet her attempts to draw their attention were unsuccessful.

The plane crash prompted the most important search in Peru’s’ history, but thanks to the density of the forest, the aircrafts couldn’t spot wreckage from the crash, including one person. After a while she couldn’t hear them and knew that she was truly on her own to seek out help.

On the ninth day within the forest, Koepcke found a hut and decided to rest in it, where she recalls thinking she’d probably die alone within the jungle. Then she heard voices. And not imaginary voices. They belonged to 3 Peruvian missionaries who lived within the hut.

“The first man I saw appeared like an angel,” said Koepcke.

The men didn’t quite feel an equivalent way. They were slightly frightened by her, and initially thought the might be a water spirit they believed in called Yemanjábut. Still, they let her stay there for an additional night and therefore the following day they took her by boat to an area hospital located during a small nearby town.

After she was treated for her injuries, Koepcke was reunited together with her father. She also helped authorities locate the plane and over the course of a couple of days they were ready to find and identify the dead bodies.

Of the 91 people aboard, Juliane Koepcke was the only survivor.

Because she was heavily questioned by the air force and therefore the police, additionally to being thrown into the media spotlight, the mourning and grief didn’t register until later. Everything she had been through, her injuries, the loss of her mother. Koepcke developed a deep fear of flying and for years had recurring nightmares.

Life After Her Survival Story

She eventually went on to review biology at the University of Kiel in Germany in 1980 then received her doctorate degree. She returned to Peru to try to to research in mammalogy. Juliane Koepcke married and have become Juliane Diller.

In 1998, she returned to the location of the crash for the documentary Wings of Hope about her incredible story. On her flight with director Werner Herzog, she once more sat in seat 19F. Koepcke found the experience to be therapeutic.

It was the primary time she ready to specialise in the incident from a distance and during a way, gain a way of closure that she still hadn’t gotten. The experience also prompted her to write down a memoir on her remarkable tale of survival called once I Fell From the Sky.

Despite overcoming the trauma of the event, there’s one question that lingered with her: why was she the sole survivor? It continues to haunt her. She said within the film, “It always will.”