Human survival has its limitations.
We are vulnerable creatures made of flesh and blood, and there are horrifying circumstances
that we mere mortals are just not designed to withstand.
Or so we’re led to believe.
Plane crashes have claimed thousands of lives since the dawn of aviation, and the odds of
living through a fiery crash from 35,000 feet are incredibly slim.
But, every once in a while there are survivors who live to tell their unbelievable version
of events.
Do the following three tales prove that some humans have the strength to survive certain
death, or are they fictional tales of pure luck that never took place?
Can you decide between what's fact.. or fiction?
The line that divides the factual from the unreal has long since blurred, the tales we
once thought fantastical now implanted as truth.
To decipher verity from the imagined, you must break from the ordinary and consider
a universe where the outlandish prevails.
Can you expand your mind to see beyond our perceived reality?
Can you decide what's fact or fiction?
Being a flight attendant is many people’s dream career path.
It brings to mind a lifestyle of worldwide travel and endless glamour, but as Anastazie
Alovik soon found out, it can sometimes mean fighting to survive a terrorist attack and
an unbelievable fall.
Story # 1: A Fall From 33,000 Feet 22-year-old Anastazie’s had dreamed of being
a flight attendant ever since her best friend landed a job.
She had also recently traveled to the UK - driven by her love of The Beatles.
So, of course, Anastazie further reasoned that a flight attendant job might allow her
to visit her beloved England more often.
Her ambition paid off, and in 1971 she joined the ranks at JAT Airways, Yugoslavia’s largest
airline.
Little did she know, it would only be a year before her highs were met with lows.
It was an icy cold January afternoon when flight 349 departed from Stockholm, Sweden,
with stopovers planned in Denmark and what is now Croatia.
Their flight departed Copenhagen Airport as scheduled at 3:15 pm.
Just 46 minutes later, an explosion ripped through the baggage compartment of the DC-9
aircraft.
Believed to be a briefcase bomb, the fireball was so powerful that it tore the plane apart
in mid-air.
Of the 28 passengers and crew on board, Anastazie would go on to be the sole survivor.
She was found in the wreckage screaming, her turquoise uniform dripping in blood.
Although alive, she suffered horrific injuries, including two broken legs, a fractured skull
and pelvis, several broken ribs and three broken vertebrae which caused temporary paralysis.
She then spent several days in a coma and remembered nothing of that fateful day after
greeting passengers boarding the plane; she only learned of the crash two weeks later
when a doctor showed her a newspaper headline, which caused her so much distress that she
had to be tranquilized.
Her death-defying survival in the face of certain death shocked the world and was front
page news.
Perhaps the weirdest part of all, her survival can be attributed to a food cart that trapped
her in the fuselage and her low blood pressure that caused her to immediately pass out.
Humans are resilient creatures, and the state of shock and fear can sometimes allow us to
survive rather impossible situations - but are we really strong enough to survive a fall
from such a height?
Surviving a crash while a pilot is attempting to land is one thing - but to live through
a 33,000-foot free-fall, trapped in only a small section of a plane?
Is that possible?
We want to hear what you think, so let us know in the comment section and be sure to
vote using our on-screen poll.
Next, we’re taking a trip to the Indian Ocean to introduce you to 12-year-old Klaire
Lakari, an incredible young girl whose determination led to the survival of an unimaginably terrifying
ordeal.
Story # 2: Horror in the Deep Blue Sea When Klaire and her mother set off from Paris
for a summer vacation in the Comoros Islands near Madagascar, neither of them dreamed that
their day would end in a cruel and punishing fight for survival.
On that fateful day, June 30th 2009, Klaire and her mother were full of excitement as
they set off on what was to be the holiday of a lifetime.
As they boarded Yemenia Flight 545, they chatted excitedly about their trip and all of the
things they wanted to do together during their idyllic island escape.
Sadly, they would never have the chance to live out their plans.
At 1:50 am during the descent into their final destination, something went terribly wrong.
The plane smashed into the ocean just nine miles north of the coastline.
The aircraft broke up as it hit the water at full speed, and Klaire was thrown out into
the unforgiving waters.
Without a lifejacket or the ability to swim, Klaire was certain to perish as she floated
alone in the shark-infested waters of the Indian Ocean.
She clung to a makeshift raft - a piece of the doomed aircraft’s fuselage - for more
than nine hours, drifting in the pitch black ocean.
She was certain that if the waters didn’t claim her, the sharks within it would.
The cries and moans of other survivors quickly turned to silence, and Klaire was left alone,
floating aimlessly. 152 people on board the Airbus A310 perished,
but somehow, Klaire only suffered from a fractured pelvis and collarbone, burns and some minor
facial injuries.
After being picked up by a passing boat, Klaire had to be convinced that she just survived
a plane crash.
Still in a deep state of shock, she thought that she had fallen from the plane after pressing
her forehead too hard against one of its windows.
How can a child who cannot swim survive for 9 hours in the Indian Ocean, after surviving
a plane crash?
Clearly, this tale is too fantastical to be true, right?
Then again, if we've learned anything from this series, it's that Fact is often stranger
than Fiction.
Let us know what you think in the comment section right now and don't forget to vote
using the on-screen poll.
Before we get into the reveal, we have one last high altitude horror story to share with
you.
People fly for business every day, and for some, taking a flight is akin to taking a
bus or a train.
Nobody ever thinks that a routine flight to see a business contact will lead to a terrifying
three day battle for survival in the unforgiving Vietnamese jungle - but for Sangmin Park,
that is exactly what happened.
Story # 3: Jungle Survival 45-year-old Sangmin Park was well adjusted
to taking flights from his home city of Seoul in South Korea.
As a business owner, he often had to travel around the world to visit clients, investors
and stakeholders, and that fateful day of October 21st 1998 was no different.
Booked onto an early morning flight to Singapore, Sangmin made his way to the airport thinking
about the meeting he was to have that evening with a potential new investor.
He boarded the Boeing 737 plane along with 188 other crew and passengers, and they set
off on what should have been a casual 7-hour flight.
The journey of Korean Air flight KE 694 had been completely smooth until, at roughly 9:53am,
a section of the aircraft’s fuselage suddenly blew out, creating a gaping hole in the side
of the plane.
Four passengers were immediately sucked out and the plane began to descent uncontrollably
from 30,000 feet.
The plane came down in a ball of fire in the Vietnamese jungle, breaking up as the captain
tried valiantly to come down through the dense trees as smooth as possible.
As sections of the plane broke apart, Samgmin’s row of seats became loose, sending two fellow
passengers and himself crashing through the jungle canopy, still strapped in with their
seatbelts.
The fauna helped break their fall, eventually landing upside down on the jungle floor.
With a badly broken arm and lots of painful cuts and bruises, Sangmin freed his seatmates;
both of which, sadly, weren't as lucky as him..
There Samgmin was, by himself, physically broken and at the mercy of mother nature.
Seeing a thick plume of smoke a short distance away, Samgmin decided to trek the woods to
see if there were any other survivors.
It wasn't an easy adventure in his condition, but he managed, eventually stumbling upon
the bigger part of the wreckage.
After a quick search, Samgmin's efforts seemed to be fruitless.
He began to break down, sobbing and unaware of what to do next.
And then, miraculously, a blood-curdling cough could be heard from the cockpit.
Samgmin violently dug through the wreckage, hands covered in blood as he ripped away at
the sheet metal.
Then, there he was - the captain.
He was unconscious, but alive, desperately clenching onto life while still making mayday
calls.
To Samgmin's surprise, there was actually someone on the other end.
Taking the radio, Samgmin was able to better explain what happened and where they were.
The two would sit together until help would arrive about 45 minutes later, but by then,
Samgmin would be alone.
When first responders landed, Samgmin was still holding onto the hands of the pilot,
silently saying "thank you".
Was there a greater force looking out for Samgmin that day?
Is it a coincidence that the pilot stayed alive just long enough to help Samgmin with
a distress call?
Or, maybe, this story was a product of our own imaginations?
Let us know what you think about our jungle tale in the comment section below, and don't
forget to vote now using the on-screen poll.
Are you ready to find out if you can decipher between fact or fiction?
Let’s look back at tonight's three stories and find out which were born from reality
and which were fabrications of the imagination.
Let’s go back to Anastazie Alovik, our flight attendant who lived through a fall from over
30,000 feet.
Do you think she really could have survived such an incredible fall?
If you said yes… then it might be possible that you’ve read the Guinness World Book
of Records.
This true tale was inspired by Vesna Vulović, a Serbian flight attendant who holds the record
for the highest freefall without the aid of a parachute.
Until her death in 2016, Vulović remained tight-lipped about the incident and shunned
her celebrity status.
Can you go two for two and guess whether Klaire Lakari really survived a crash that killed
over 150 others?
If you said no.. then you'd be wrong.
This shocking story of survival is completely true.
Bahia Bakari was named the “miracle child” by the media after she was deemed to be the
sole survivor of the deadliest airplane crash in an ocean.
So how about our third story about Sangmin and his adventures through the jungle?
Although it's entirely possible, our version of events was completely penned up by our
own writers.
How well did you do in tonight's video?
Did you look past the deception of our world and define the oft-blurred line that struggles
to separate lies from the truth?
Let us all know in the comment section below and should you find the urge to test your
perceptions again, be sure to subscribe and join us next time when we ask you to decide
what's fact... or fiction.