🎄 The Christmas Miracle of Juliane Koepcke

Not so much for the 91 others who perished

This happened 29 years before the hit TV series Survivor premiered on North American Television. 17-year-old Juliane Koepcke and her mother, both from Chile, boarded a flight from Lima to Pucallpa, Peru. It was Christmas Eve, 1971. Juliane had just graduated from high school the day before.

Her father Hans-Wilhelm urged his wife and daughter to avoid flying with the airline, which had a poor reputation. They booked the flight, nonetheless.

At the same time, 10-year-old Jeff Probst has nestled all snug in his bed, with visions of sugar-plums dancing in his head. Remember how restless those Christmas Eve nights were when we were kids? Me either. 😉

This is a picture of the type and model of the plane Juliane and her mom were on.

The passengers were anxious, being Christmas Eve. The LANSA Flight 508 was a Lockheed L-188A Electra turboprop that was running 7 hours late.

“Suddenly we entered into a very heavy, dark cloud. My mother was anxious but I was OK, I liked flying.

Ten minutes later it was obvious that something was very wrong.

There was very heavy turbulence and the plane was jumping up and down, parcels and luggage were falling from the locker, there were gifts, flowers, and Christmas cakes flying around the cabin.

When we saw lightning around the plane, I was scared. My mother and I held hands but we were unable to speak. Other passengers began to cry and weep and scream.

After about 10 minutes, I saw a very bright light on the outer engine on the left. My mother said very calmly: "That is the end, it's all over." Those were the last words I ever heard from her.

The plane jumped down and went into a nose-dive. It was pitch black and people were screaming, then the deep roaring of the engines filled my head.

Suddenly the noise stopped and I was outside the plane. I was in a freefall, strapped to my seat bench and hanging head-over-heels. The whispering of the wind was the only noise I could hear.

I felt completely alone.

I could see the canopy of the jungle spinning towards me. Then I lost consciousness and remember nothing of the impact. Later I learned that the plane had broken into pieces about two miles above the ground.

I woke the next day and looked up into the canopy. The first thought I had was: "I survived an air crash."

I shouted out for my mother in but I only heard the sounds of the jungle. I was completely alone.

I had broken my collarbone and had some deep cuts on my legs but my injuries weren't serious. I realized later that I had ruptured a ligament in my knee but I could walk.”

They say the 10,000-foot free fall while being strapped to a seat on either side of her acting like a sort of parachute saved her life. She was the only survivor out of the 92 passengers and crew that took off that day.

It is the deadliest lightning strike disaster in history.

While Jeff opened presents and enjoyed a Christmas with his parents, Juliane experienced quite a different Christmas:

“I could hear the planes overhead searching for the wreck but it was a very dense forest and I couldn't see them.

I was wearing a very short, sleeveless mini-dress and white sandals. I had lost one shoe but I kept the other because I am very short-sighted and had lost my glasses, so I used that shoe to test the ground ahead of me as I walked.

Snakes are camouflaged there and they look like dry leaves. I was lucky I didn't meet them or maybe just that I didn't see them.

I found a small creek and walked in the water because I knew it was safer.

At the crash site, I had found a bag of sweets. When I had finished them I had nothing more to eat and I was very afraid of starving.

It was very hot and very wet and it rained several times a day. But it was cold at the night and to be alone in that mini-dress was very difficult.

On the fourth day, I heard the noise of a landing king vulture which I recognized from my time at my parents' reserve.

I was afraid because I knew they only land when there is a lot of carrion and I knew it was bodies from the crash.

When I turned a corner in the creek, I found a bench with three passengers rammed headfirst into the earth.

I was paralyzed by panic. It was the first time I had seen a dead body.

I thought my mother could be one of them but when I touched the corpse with a stick, I saw that the woman's toenails were painted - my mother never polished her nails.

I was immediately relieved but then felt ashamed of that thought.

By the 10th day, I couldn't stand properly and I drifted along the edge of a larger river I had found. I felt so lonely like I was in a parallel universe far away from any human being.

I thought I was hallucinating when I saw a really large boat. When I went to touch it and realized it was real, it was like an adrenaline shot.

But [then I saw] there was a small path into the jungle where I found a hut with a palm leaf roof, an outboard motor, and a liter of gasoline.

I had a wound on my upper right arm. It was infested with maggots about one centimeter long. I remembered our dog had the same infection and my father had put kerosene in it, so I sucked the gasoline out and put it into the wound.

The pain was intense as the maggots tried to get further into the wound. I pulled out about 30 maggots and was very proud of myself. I decided to spend the night there.

The next day I heard the voices of several men outside. It was like hearing the voices of angels.

When they saw me, they were alarmed and stopped talking. They thought I was a kind of water goddess - a figure from a local legend who is a hybrid of a water dolphin and a blonde, white-skinned woman.

But I introduced myself in Spanish and explained what had happened. They treated my wounds and gave me something to eat and the next day took me back to civilization.

The day after my rescue, I saw my father. He could barely talk and in the first moment, we just held each other.

For the next few days, he frantically searched for news of my mother. On 12 January they found her body.”

Later I found out that she also survived the crash but was badly injured and she couldn't move. She died several days later. I dread to think what her last days were like.”

(…Source)

Her married name is Diller

Wikipedia, Juliane Diller (Koepcke) 2019

Juliane is now a librarian in Munich, Germany. She moved to Germany for school and achieved a doctorate in Biology.

And Jeff Probst is still the Host, Executive Producer, and Director of the TV series Survivor.

The Electra was LANSA's last aircraft; the company lost its operating permit 11 days after the crash.

I wish all of you a Merry Christmas!

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More: Another single airplane survivor story: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Filair_Let_L-410_crash