They’re calling it a miracle: a plane crashed in Mexico and everyone on board survived
A plane crashed shortly after taking off from Durango, Mexico, and all 103 people on board survived. But it was a close call; just after everyone escaped, the plane burst into flames. It’s quite a story.
Welcome to Plain English, episode 76, for Monday, August 13, 2018. I’m Jeff, the producer is JR, and you are listening to the perfect podcast for learning English. It’s perfect—well, it’s perfect for a lot of reasons, but one reason it’s perfect is the transcripts. If you’d like to read along as you listen, you can do so at PlainEnglish.com/76. And if you speak Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French, Japanese or Chinese, then you have no excuse for missing even a single word. That’s because the transcripts on our web site will translate the hardest words and phrases for you, instantly, so you can understand every word without ever pressing pause. PlainEnglish.com/76 for today’s episode transcript.
Like always, we’ll talk about an English word or phrase at the end of the episode. Today I’ve got a phrasal verb for you: “sum up.” Sum up—listen for it during the main story.
All passengers and crew survive Mexican plane crash
An Aeromexico plane crashed shortly after taking off from the city of Durango, Mexico, and all 103 people aboard lived to tell about it. It happened two weeks ago today.
It was a dramatic scene in the north western Mexican city, as the airplane crashed just 300 yards from the end of the runway. The weather was bad: passengers said it was raining and that there was zero visibility. There were reports of hail in the area. According to passenger accounts, it seemed like the plane was hit with a burst of wind that knocked it downward shortly after it had taken off.
The plane hit the ground nose first and slid on the flat ground before it hit some trees and came to a stop in a ditch. The cabin was chaos: the cabin was thick with smoke, the smell of jet fuel in the air, and an overall sense of panic prevailed. A passenger actually recorded the whole thing on a cell phone. In the video, you can hear a child crying, people screaming, someone praying to God, and another passenger calling out, “Open the door” in Spanish. A hole had broken out near the wing, and the passengers and crew evacuated through that hole and through one of the exits.
The person who took the video is Ramin Parsa, a pastor at a California church. He said afterward, “Imagine you put 100 people in a room, in a dark room, pitch dark and filled with smoke and there’s a small door and everyone’s trying to find it.” Everyone did find it, eventually, and everyone got out just in time. The plane burst into flames moments later. Family members rushed to the airport to check on their loved ones and were relieved when the governor of the state of Durango announced that everyone was alive.
Passenger Jacqueline Flores told Mexican journalists that she and other passengers gathered to pray after they escaped when they saw the plane—which they had been trapped in just minutes before—explode in flames.
There were four crew members and 99 passengers, including nine children and two infants, for a total of 103 people. Eighty were hospitalized shortly after the crash. The pilot was in the worst shape of all. He suffered a spinal injury and required surgery, but he is expected to live. An eight-year-old girl had burns over a quarter of her body.
The Rev. Ezequiel Sanchez, a rector at a church in the Chicago suburbs, was in Durango visiting family and celebrating his fiftieth birthday party. After the plane took off, he said it felt like it would be a bumpy ride. When it appeared to be going down, he said he was getting ready for the worst and said a prayer. He attributes their survival to a miracle because if the plane had gotten any higher, then the chances for survival would have been much, much smaller. Another passenger said he didn’t believe in miracles before, but he certainly does now.
Another passenger, Ruby Rodriguez, told the New York Times that she felt certain she would die—right up until she heard a flight attendant telling her to run and escape. She had a quote that I think probably best sums up the emotions of the passengers. She’s quoted in a New York Times article saying, “I feel sad that it happened, that people went through the traumatic experience but at the same time I am just happy I am alive.” I bet.
The plane in question was an Embraer and was built in 2008 and underwent maintenance in February. Aeromexico’s last safety incident was in 1981, when a plane crashed, killing everyone on board. The Mexican government, assisted by investigators from the United States, is still determining the exact cause of the crash.
That’s some scary stuff. Okay, today we are going to talk about the phrasal verb to sum up. But before we get into that, I wanted to say hi to a few listeners. First of all Ricardo, from Brazil. He wanted to say he really likes the program and told me to say thank you to everyone involved on his behalf. And I thought, that’s really great, that’s a very nice note. And then I realized Ricardo is being clever since we talked about “on my behalf” back in episode 4! That was one of the very first expressions I picked to explain in detail. And then I got another note from Wooyoung in Korea, who used the phrasal verb “settle in” in his note; we talked about that one just a week or two ago in episode 72. So Ricardo and Wooyoung, thanks for writing, but especially thank you for putting into practice what you’re hearing on the program. Keep up the good work!
One more greeting to Tereza from the Czech Republic. She started listening when she was living in California—and now that she’s back home in Europe, she said listening makes her remember what it was like to be living in the US. Tereza, thanks for making us a part of your routine.
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