Juliane Koepcke was 17 when she survived a 10,000-foot fall into the Peruvian rainforest after her plane was struck by lightning on Christmas Eve 1971. The LANSA flight from Lima to Pucallpa broke apart mid-air, and Koepcke fell strapped to her seat, landing in dense jungle. She spent 11 days alone before being rescued.
Koepcke, now in her 50s, recalls the terrifying moments before the crash. The plane entered a dark cloud, turbulence threw luggage and gifts around the cabin, and passengers screamed. Her mother, seeing a bright light on the engine, said calmly, 'That is the end, it's all over.' Those were her last words. Koepcke lost consciousness during the fall and woke the next day on the forest floor with a broken collarbone and cuts, but able to walk.
She had spent 18 months at her parents' research station 30 miles away, learning survival skills. She found a small creek and walked in the water to avoid snakes, using her remaining sandal to test the ground. She had lost her glasses and was short-sighted. She found a bag of sweets at the crash site but ran out of food by the fourth day. She heard search planes but could not see them through the dense canopy.
On the fourth day, she saw a king vulture, which she knew landed near carrion. She discovered a bench with three bodies rammed into the earth. She feared her mother might be among them but saw the woman's toenails were painted, unlike her mother's. By the tenth day, she could barely stand and drifted along a river. She found a boat and a hut with an outboard motor and petrol. She used the petrol to treat a maggot-infested wound on her arm, a technique learned from her father.
Koepcke was eventually found by local fishermen and taken to a nearby town. She was the sole survivor of the crash, which killed 91 people. She later became a biologist, working in the same rainforest where she survived.
