breaks. one car was flipped over by a rock slide. there were no injuries reported, though. i'm don lemon in the cnn newsroom keeping you informed. cnn, the most trusted name in news. >> 5191 crashed. the tragic ending to a super bowl. >> it crashed in the dense forest laden hills. >> there were no survivors. then they found mohammed crying but alive. the 2-year-old laying -- >> george lamson jr. >> i don't believe in random

chance. i know i go against the scientists on this. i believe that -- i believe that my life was spared for a reason, either i wanted or something higher power than me wanted. >> george, turn around. wave goodbye. >> it was early monday morning, a group of tourists boarded a plane after a weekend of gambling, skiing and watching the super bowl in reno. the plane took off, but within minutes it had crashed. 17-year-old george lamson jr., he was thrown from the plane but miraculously he was able to walk away. you weren't badly hurt at all, were you? >> no. i feel fine. i just have a few sores along

the side of my leg and right here on my hand. i feel just great. >> very few people have ever survived a plane crash, george. maybe you could tell us how it went. >> well, we took off and everything seemed okay and we were fine. and then all of a sudden we hit some turbulence. and we started falling down from the sky. and the pilot told us we were going to crash. and we crashed. >> the pilot told you? what exactly did he say? >> he says, we're going down. >> going down. and how much time do you think you had between hearing that and actual impact? >> it was about two seconds at the very most. >> what did you do in those two seconds? any thoughts of trying to save your life? >> yes. i covered up my body as much as possible. i lifted my legs up and hoped for the best. >> considering the impact of the crash and what the crash site looks like, the fact that he's in the condition that he is in really is a miracle. there's no question about it. >> well, you are of all the

gamblers on that plane, sir, you are the luckiest. >> absolutely. >> in reno, the world began to wonder at the luck and poise of 17-year-old george lamson jr. of st. paul. he lost his father in the debris of the old lockheed electra airliner, tossed clear of the fireball still strapped in his the cretin high senior assumed the blessing and burden of being the only survivor. >> so i kicked the wall while we hit the ground. so i was just sliding through all this fire and debris. >> george's demeanor when he first came out, when we first were seeing him in the hospital bed and then later when he came out in the wheelchair, he was sort of surprised to see everybody there. you know, there was this sort of excitement. remember he was 17. all of a sudden all these people are there with all these cameras and they're all for him. you know? and we were kind of conscious of that. and yet we knew he had been through this horrific accident. when the images of that moment were carried back around the country, because it was covered

everywhere, it was the biggest story in the country at the time, people were stunned and he was completely composed and had even a touch of humor. somebody asked him if he would fly again. he said, yeah, i just don't want to have an accident again. >> i notice that the condition i am in compared to the other people, i feel very, very lucky. >> being placed as a miracle boy or someone that is a recipient of a miracle, people look at you and think that you've got a destiny. there's something god saved you for. there's a special reason for you to be here, and that's unrealistic. that's completely unrealistic. but i look at my life, and i see my daughter. i see my life. it's definitely worth living for. it's worth being here still. and these other things that

people place on me, i can't live their fantasies or their expectations. i'm going to be okay with who i am. i'm fine. now to a tragic crash at sea and one small miracle. officials say a 14-year-old girl was plucked alive from the indian ocean when a yemeni plane went down. there were 153 people on board. >> the community of comoros islanders living in france has been devastated by this accident. many lost loved ones who were going home for the holidays. the 14-year-old who beat all the odds flew to paris on a french government jet with a special medical team. bruised and cut, bahia bakari was just able to talk.

in paris, they say the emotional trauma is just beginning. "it will be very hard for her," he says. "she survived but her mother was killed in the crash." [ speaking french ]

[ speaking french ] [ speaking in french ] [ speaking in french ] [ speaking in french ]

[ speaking in french ] there was nothing out of the ordinary. there was nothing wrong with the plane. there was nothing wrong with me or the captain. >> so they taxied out to where their map told them to go and sat actually directly below the tower. the tower that morning was understaffed. it was a 6:00 a.m. flight. there should have been two people in the tower. there was only one. they held short directly underneath him for about 15

seconds, i think. he had his back turned so he never saw that they were headed out the wrong way and he cleared them without turning around and looking. >> the last thing i remember was when captain clay said, you have the controls? i said, yes, i have the controls. i said set thrust. he set the thrust and away we went. >> cleared for takeoff on runway 22, the pilots take off from the much shorter runway 26. pilots struggle to pull the plane into the air, but simply run out of room. >> he wasn't scheduled to fly. he was supposed to be commuting home. >> i was not supposed to be on the flight. >> neither was the captain. >> the headline of the hour is what we feared, that 49 of the 50 souls on board that aircraft have died. >> at least one confirmed survivor. >> one known survivor.

and we have an update on that man's situation at the u.k. hospital. >> i remember the news being on. because i kept wanting to hear possibly a survivor. is there a survivor. there has been confirmation that there's one survivor. let it be my mother. let it be my mother. >> at this point they were reporting that the one person who survived was a crew member. so i had a 50/50 chance it was him. >> the coroner got in touch with my father and i. and i heard through his phone standing next to me, "i'm sorry." >> i got the first call around 7:30, 8:00 in the morning. it was about noon when i finally found out that it was not -- that jim was the survivor. >> three first responders kept tempting their own danger and were able to rescue first officer james paul hanke from the cockpit. no one else can be saved.

hospital officials say they felt they were close to identifying the girl when anthony sheehan called early this morning. he said his granddaughter has brown hair, brown eyes, a chipped tooth and was wearing purple nail polish. the description matched. cecelia has burns over 30% of her body. she lost her mother, father and 6-year-old brother in the fiery plane crash. cecelia's grandfather has been visiting her several times a day. >> she asks the nurses for her mother. >> the hospital describes her as a talkative little girl whose spirits are lifted by stuffed animals, strawberry milk shakes and bedtime stories. >> the message has already arrived here loud and clear that the whole world is rooting for cecelia. >> cecelia has now received

nearly 1900 gifts, 18,000 letters and $130,000. the latest gesture of goodwill comes all the way from tulsa, oklahoma. >> today flowers came from the wife of the co-pilot who died in flight 255. doctors say it will be a day or two until they know for sure if cecelia will require more skin grafts, but the prognosis for the miracle girl is extremely good. >> i'm happily married to my high school sweetheart. i'm studying to get my masters in art therapy. i am happy. i'm just -- i've never been happier. i think about the accident every day. it's kind of hard not to think about it when i look in the mirror. i have visual scars. my arms and my legs. and i have a scar on my forehead.

i have memories of my parents. not so much like how they talked but more like interactions with them. like, for example, i remember sitting in the car with my mom listening to the radio. and a song came on that was called "broken wings," it was a big '80s song. clearly about like love or a stalker or something. but i asked her about the song. and i said, mom, what's this song about? and she said, oh, it's about a bird whose wings were broken. she was trying to explain it to me. i was like 3, and i said, oh, well did the bird get better? and she said, yes, yes, he got better.

>> okay. that's right behind that buffet. >> yes, sir. >> bulkhead. you couldn't see any seats in front of you. you could just see a bulkhead. is that correct? >> george jr. has spent a decade trying to make sense out of that january night in reno. >> there's people in all walks of life that have suffered loss like i have, and it's just -- they don't get any recognition for it. i think what makes me different is that when this tragedy struck, i was under the spotlight by media, by everybody in my town. everybody knew who i was. and it was a good feeling to have people know who you are and care. but when it stopped, when people don't remember who you are, it's a very big vacuum. and that hurt a lot.

i would sleep a lot. and i would eat a lot, too. i mean, i'd do everything i could not to think about what was going on in front of me. >> those amazing hands of george lamson. >> march of that year i dropped out of college. >> now you see it. ten years from now i'll be jamming on stage. >> this is like 1987. i was driving like 150 miles an hour on this particular curve. and it was just really -- i don't know why i did that. i just liked the thrill of being on the edge of death. and i felt like that maybe i'm being protected, you know, and i wanted to see if it was really true. received some settlement

money in 1986 and 1987. i went through that money pretty quickly because i was not thinking about tomorrow. i didn't think i was going to live to five years from now. >> hannah was a good motivation for me to get myself straightened out. so once hannah was born, i changed. i had to make a change. and that's what i did. this year is my junior year in high school. i went to an all-boys school. totally unlike what you went through. at that time in my life, i was working for my dad. >> if he wasn't in the plane crash, i think he'd be more successful. he was in a lot of sports back in high school and he was really good at it. he had like the life he always wanted with the girlfriend, the friends and everything. and he probably would still be in minnesota now and not in reno. i probably wouldn't even be here.

>> this is the airport where we took off on january 21st, 1985. i didn't move here to be near the crash scene. it was just more of a -- i don't know. >> you think really deep about what you're doing with your life and all the people that were involved with this accident that may have done more with their life. and you feel guilty that you're not using your life to do something better. >> he always talks about it, he's sometimes depressed about it. he's like why am i still here. like i made like a fool out of myself. like i'm not even doing anything with my life, and it makes me sad. >> during the course of my life, the last 25 years, i have been curious to know what makes a person heal from a situation that happened to me. i've never been able to find out or talk to anybody that has been

through what i've been through. to my knowledge, there are 14 lone survivors of airplane crashes of large magnitude. i would like to learn a little bit about what happened to the others that have gone through what i've gone through. the names of the 14 survivors that i know of are reuben van kasao, bahia bakari, james fillanti, joseph turbay, sergei petrov, erica delgado, cecelia sheehan, julianne kopke and juan lu, and i would really like to know how they're coming along, what they've learned. i would like to be friends with these people, to let them know that i'm there for them to help them the best that i can from what i've learned.

[ speaking french ] 6 brgsd spugs [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ]

[ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ]

[ spiking french ]

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>> the way it's built, so if i pick this side up and then

if i try to pick it up like that, that's what happens. so i can't do it myself. >> might slide off the edge. >> he was as if an angel wrapped his wings around him and held him because if you'd seen the cockpit, there's no way he could have gotten out of that. there wasn't even room for his body to be there. >> the only reason he survived, it was the quick action on the part of the rescue workers, the two public safety officers that found him. and they actually stuck their heads up into the remains of the cockpit, found him, removed him, recognized that his injuries were so severe and life-threatening that they didn't have time to wait for an ambulance and they put him in the back of one of the suvs, the police suvs and sped him to the hospital. >> it's a miracle that, "a," anyone survived that accident. but it is an incredible astronomical miracle that a pilot survived that accident. because let me tell you, pilots

always die. always. >> they had cut all his clothes off. he always wore this cross on his tie. they didn't know he was laying on this tie. and she found the bleed and the cross came up on x-ray right over his heart. >> he had come to, and he's like what happened? and i said, you were in a plane crash. and he asked, what happened to everybody else? i asked the doctor, should i tell him? and then i told him, you're the only one. and he couldn't talk or anything. so he just wept. >> my first concern was the passengers that were my responsibility that day. >> he by no means pulled the long straw and won the lottery because he got to live. first of all, he would have rather died. no doubt about it. he would have rather died. his conviction as a pilot was so great that he would have rather gone down with the ship. and that's how he felt. this will never not be in our lives.

and it's such an emotional cross that he bears that no one really sees but me. and he would have given anything to have gone with all of them rather than sitting here today and doing this. >> the faa has admitted it violated its own policy by having only one controller in that tower at bluegrass airport. a second controller should have been in the tower handling planes on radar while the other worked with planes on the runway. >> everybody was really very focused on the tower and the fact that there was only one controller and he had his back turned and that kind of thing. and then the airline came out and announced proactively that the pilots had violated sterile cockpit. >> sterile cockpit rule is actually a federal air regulation the pilots are required to follow that anytime you're below 10,000 feet and the airplane's under its own power you're only allowed to talk about what is pertinent to the flight. >> after the airline came out and announced that they violated sterile cockpit, then the whole

thing shifted towards the pilots. >> when the public gets ahold of the cockpit voice recorder transcripts, and they see this 20 minutes of chatter, i think there is some confusion thinking they were chattering about everything that didn't make a -- no wonder they had a problem. that's not sterile cockpit. getting to know each other on a flight deck and this casual conversation that tends to precede each flight is actually extremely important. and what that does is it breaks down barriers. >> as a human kind of figure out how you tick, and you need to figure out how i tick. >> violation of sterile cockpit is extremely common. it happens all the time. it's happening right now. that does not cause airplanes to crash, however, what it does do is it removes one safety net. >> there was windows. and the head guy came in to tell us to stay away from the windows. so someone had evidently made a threat. >> when something like this

happens, you want somebody to blame because you're hurting. it helps to focus. and, you know, i totally totally understand and don't -- i have no animosity towards any of them. it was heartbreaking. >> unfortunately, it's easier to blame the person who can take it than the person who's no longer there. had he been killed in this thing, too, i don't want to say that would cause a lot of closure for anybody. i'm speaking of me. it would have stopped a lot of that, the anger, because there's nobody to be angry to. >> my feeling has always been if jeff had lived, we would have taken him in any form. i think he would have either -- we would have just lost him mentally or he would have found a way to commit suicide i think is where he would have wound up. i just don't think he could have done it. i think for him it's a blessing that he's gone.

>> i have an article that "the kentucky herald" had published that showed faces of the people who were on board. it gives profiles, and not that i go back and look at it just to torture myself, but just to see who the people were on the plane and see what they had done. the age range is so big from 16 to i think 70. but i don't think there'll ever be a time that maybe i can forgive myself because, again, going back to what i had mentioned in earlier conversation, the people that came on board the plane were my responsibility. they were mine and captain clay's responsibility. and if there's anything that i can say to the family members is that i'm sorry we made that mistake because they lost their

loved ones that day. and i just hope that god can give the family members some comfort, some peace, and some compassion so that their burden gets less as time goes on. when you have diabetes like i do, you want a way to help minimize blood sugar spikes. support heart health. and your immune system. now there's new glucerna advance with three benefits in one.

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♪ i currently live with my dad. i have one stepbrother but i call my real brother, because it's the only thing i really have really. and my mom basically lives like ten minutes away from here so i see her like every day. my dad doesn't like decorating at all because he feels it's a man's house and it's like a man cave, and it's like he has no women here besides me. so it's like i don't really have that much authority in the house. >> my name is george lamson. i'm also a sole survivor of a plane crash that happened in reno, nevada in 1985. i'm trying to reach out to the other sole survivors out there in hopes to talk to you and maybe someday meet you. it's funny that there are so few of us that have been through what we have been through and almost none of us have ever connected with each other. i'm reaching out to everybody. the reason why i'm doing this is

to try to help others, and that's my motivation. i completely understand where you're coming from. i was there, but if you ever change your mind, you know, please let me know. >> are you okay? >> yeah. i'm okay. i spent some time on the phone with erica delgato. >> it's closure to him. so it's helping him cope with everything and getting to know what other people are feeling. i don't know. i just think it's really cool. >> hello, bahia. my name is george lamson. i live in the united states. i was 17 years old at the time of the accident. all the people on that flight died, including my father. >> well, he sends letters out to hopefully like get a response in return, but usually it comes out not getting any. and he gets disappointed.

[ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ]

[ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] [ speaking french ]

[ speaking french ] [ speaking french ] >> what's that? i hope you're not going out there. >> i don't know. >> thank god. i wrote an e-mail to cecelia once, and she's the one that i knew most about because it happened so close to when my accident happened. i felt so bad for her, you know, a 4-year-old girl lost her entire family. i got a reply back. and then i never heard from her again. so i respected her privacy and

stayed away. >> i have read about other sole survivors, especially that little girl two years ago, bahia. i read about one woman who like her plane crashed into like the forest, and she had to survive for a few days. when i read about things like that, it makes me feel almost inferior like she had to work to survive, and i just woke up in a hospital. you know, i just lied there and everybody else did the work. i got this tattoo as a reminder of where i've come from. and i see it as like so many things, scars, whatever, were put on my body against my will. and i decided to put this on my body for myself. i think that me surviving was random.

i just happened to be in the right place at the right time. but it was my wake-up call. i am enjoying every day of my life now. >> 156 loved ones who perished at 8:46 p.m. northwest airlines flight 255 that we remember by name. wade -- >> but i come out all the time, every year. you know, it's my one thing i do, but they were home on vacation like i said, and little billy climbed a tree. my father said get out of that tree before you break a leg. we wish now he'd broken a leg because they would have stayed there. >> i've never been to the memorial. i've never been a part of -- i feel like i am part of the family, but i've never like actively been a part. i feel like maybe i would just get way too much attention. the family members of flight 255, they know that i like to be private.

they understand that i don't want to be in the spotlight. i think i'm the only one that's ever met the survivor. i went to a meeting in new york for two days, and she was on the list. i didn't know her. when i met her, all i did was cry cry cry. she never cried. but i cried like a little baby because to me there was a part of this whole episode that was missing is her. and it was like when i met her, it put that little piece of the puzzle in place. >> when i realized that i was the only person to survive that plane crash, i was maybe in middle school, high school maybe, being an adolescent and confused, so it was just extra stress for me, and i remember feeling angry and survivor's guilt.

why didn't my brother survive? why didn't anybody? you know, why me? >> so i was working the night of the crash. one of the guys i was with, dan heard a moaning. after a few minutes we saw a chair that was laying upside down,'s picked up the chair and underneath it was little cecelia the survivor. >> john really makes an effort to be active in my life. we talk all the time on the internet. he came to my wedding, and we danced at my reception. >> i didn't think that nobody would survive. i guess the feeling of it, i guess with the 156 people perishing that night, i went home with i guess a little glimmer of hope where the other guys on my crew really didn't go home with anything. >> i feel like i need to keep in touch with john because he's almost like a link to the void that i mentioned earlier where i don't remember what happened.

maybe one time i asked him in detail, i was like, oh, what did my mother's body look like? she must have looked not so good. and he didn't really want to tell me. i'm sure that would be traumatizing. but he knows the things that i don't know. and it's a link between the before and the after. as of now, i plan on going to the memorial service for 2012. i may have been quiet over the years, and i continue to want to be private. but i do think about you guys and what you must have gone through. the great american novel.

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that is daddy. that is mama. that is sharon. that is shelby. ♪ >> the girls actually don't have i mean, saarah was 3 months old when he died. what are you going to remember from being a newborn. shelby had just turned 2. i get a lot of questions about heaven, about, well, did daddy love us. i try very hard to weave him into our everyday existence. if somebody eats cookie dough, daddy loved cookie dough. unfortunately, in this day and age, everything is preserved forever. everything is on the internet. so everyone damning headline, every nasty thing that was said. one of these days, somebody is going to google his name, and you're going to find 15,000 pages, literally. so, someday i'm going to have to

have some pretty tough conversations with them about what was said about their dad. it's not going to be a fun part. >> and at both ends of the string through each bead. or you can do two separate ones. ♪ >> okay. let's go through the rest of the single engine emergency action items, please. >> did you turn the engine off? >> yes, the engine is off. >> okay, good. >> when he first was in school, he made the whole cockpit, and even went so far as to screw in all the switches. >> confirm? >> confirm. >> confirm? >> confirm. >> feather. electrical feather switch. confirm? >> confirm. >> we used to sit together and do call-outs in the hot garage, because he built it, it was so big, we couldn't get it in the door of the house. co-pilot ejection seat, confirmed? >> no. that would be negative, captain

confirmed? >> no. that would be negative, capta>c confirmed? >> no. that would be negative, capta c confirmed? >> no. that would be negative, captain. >> confirm. >> and it was his dream. you know, to be able to live it was amazing. and how it had to end was -- but at least he got to do it. >> well, i built it to be as realistic as possible to when i -- when i did upgrade at gulfstream. i just wanted my flows and my captain call-outs to be as concise as possible. a good pilot is always learning. and they always are. i would be doing it in my sleep, all the procedures, all the moves of the handles, all the switches and stuff. and she would be like the next day, you were talking in your sleep and your were doing some single engine emergency procedures. oh, really? but that's how engrained it

needs to be so that when the situation does arise, it comes natural to you and the other person flying the plane. whenever you face trials or struggles of any kind, know that the trusting of your faith develops perseverance. so, well, if god -- going back, if god is such a loving god, we should already have it good. well, but then how do we develop faith in him to know that at the end we're going to live in, you know, eternal peace forever. can you measure forever? how long is forever? but be joyful always. pray continually. continue to give thanks in all circumstances for this is god's will for you. i'm supposed to be joyful that i'm paralyzed, and i can't walk, and i can't do the things, but i should because i'm alive and i can still do the things, almost all the things i did prior to the accident, except for stand and walk and fly.

so there is that constant human struggle that we have. so that's it. god, that's my religious thing for the day. ♪ you turned up the fun. tylenol® provides strong pain relief while being gentle on your stomach. but for everything we do, we know you do so much more. tylenol®.

packing up for france to see bahia. hope she likes my outfits. well, she lives in paris, but we're going to normandy for the weekend. and it will be pretty cool. >> how are you doing, kid? >> daddy, will this look good on me? >> i think so. it looks really cute. >> oh, yay. >> let's go. but i'm excited. it's going to be really cool. >> electronic devices. it's very important that you turn off your cellular telephone. they must be completely turned off. >> it is good. yeah. throw some garlic and butter on it, oh, yeah. i have read so much about europe, i have never seen it in person, though.

i can go weeks without thinking about what happened to me. but it either comes up in a dream, comes up in conversation, comes up in just normal life. i'll see something and i'll remember. sometimes it puts me in a bad state of mind and makes me very depressed. >> at the end of the day the whole thing was a perfect storm. >> 31 investigators would spend 13,000 hours examining every facet of the crash. >> the ntsb was created to investigate accidents, and really, the important part of that is to have an independent organization that is not connected to any group or organization. we're not the regulator. we want to make sure through our investigations that we're really finding out the truth. >> from an investigator's standpoint i look at this stuff and i see the systems picture,

in some ways how things were set up there, it is kind of amazing to me that it took seven days before somebody -- before we had this accident. >> what happened that morning was they ended up stopping here thinking they were over here. the turn to this runway, if you notice this angular relationship is almost identical to what they have done in the past. the picture turning onto the runway was basically identical. the mechanisms that are in place to advise the crew that that section of taxiway were closed was not provided to them. these low barricade lights were not that visible. several other crews mentioned they did not see these. these lights were found were turned 90 degrees. they were turned the wrong way. one of the more poignant events that took place in this investigation for me, i was approached by a comair employee saying that some mechanics wanted to talk to us. they were worried for quite some time that an accident would

happen, that they found that area confusing. so i obviously felt this was very important and brought this to the attention of the ntsb person that i was responsible for reporting to. and i was told we don't need to talk to them because we already have enough evidence showing this is confusing. >> even though the construction project altered the taxiways, new maps and charts using cockpits at comair and other airlines were not updated. >> a jefferson map or chart is the maps and charts the pilots use to not only navigate the airways in the sky, but also the surface of any airport. the jefferson map was actually incorrect that morning. what was on the chart did not match the signs that the pilots were seeing outside the window. >> with us not knowing there was construction going on, on blue grass lexington airport that day, we did not have the appropriate information to do our jobs in a manner to get

passengers from point a to b safely. >> we interviewed numerous people that had flown with jeff and jim prior to the accident, in fact, including check airmen, or individuals that grade them and rate their abilities. and what we found across the board was terms like professionalism, great guys, very standard, highly competent was one that i heard. it was the same thing for every single person we interviewed. we heard nothing negative at all. >> going up, because i have this, i -- unlike my brother's house that didn't have the railings, we try to go down and we thought i fell down. so i have this. i'm not going any place. from here down, it's practically nil. this feels so good. i'm playing with you, because no leg. because the pain medicine has kicked in, i don't feel the pain. when i push down, all my back muscles are being used. that's -- >> i was going up to new york for christmas to visit my

brothers, my nieces and nephews. i was happy and excited, and in a split second, i went back to the family members that lost somebody on flight 5191. what are they thinking about and what are they going through with christmas coming up? they don't have that person there anymore. >> this is my home, which is mostly full of animals. which i take a big part from my mother. she was a dolphin lover, whales, dolphins, manatees. she was standing out on the dock, and there was a dolphin that just popped up and i got a picture of her with it. photos with my no, ma'am would be that one. it just captures her smile that i do miss quite a bit. i have a hard time walking by it without getting a little choked up. there's still those -- i want to call mom. and even after five years, i want to call mom, and i can't do it.

>> okay. that's enough, all right? that's enough. >> no it's not. >> you forget you can't smell. >> yes. can i smell? see? >> no, you can't. he overseasons everything. >> i couldn't imagine, one, somebody doing this on their own. and two, i just -- i wouldn't wish this on my worst enemy. i've cried harder than any man has ever cried or should be able to cry, and my wife was there to support me to where i could just put my head on her shoulder and cry. it's that constant struggle where my inner voice wants to keep going forward, and the good voice says, yeah, come on, you have that inner strength to do it. but the bad voice says no, stay here. have another shot of liquor. i was doing a dr. jeckyl and mr.

hyde and her being my caregiver at the time, being with me 24 hours, she would be the one that would have to put up with the intense roller coaster ride of my feelings. so has it gotten better in the five years? yes. but do i still have the bad days that she still has to put up with? yes. >> am i heavy? no, i'm not heavy? oh, my gosh. this hurts my booty. oh, we've got to go up a hill and make a right. oh, i think i'm making the tires crunch. ♪ opped by the house? uh-huh. yea. alright, whenever you get your stuff, run upstairs, get cleaned up for dinner. you leave the house in good shape? yea. yea, of course. ♪ [ sportscaster talking on tv ] last-second field go-- yea, sure ya did. [ male announcer ] introducing at&t digital life. personalized home security and automation.

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actually, i don't really want to tell her anything right off the bat. i would like to listen to her first, see where she's at. and then go from there, because what i know now, everybody's experience is different. >> it's 9:00 p.m., and as you can see, it's still bright outside and we're on our way to see bahia and her dad at the train station and i'm excited. i said just to be yourself and express the way you want to. >> hello, nice to meet you. >> hello, nice to meet you. ♪

>> we went to this house that has all like these american games, french games that we can incorporate in our language to communicate. >> most sole survivors are young. under the age of 17. i don't know why -- we'll never know the answer to this. this is a miracle. i believe it's a miracle what happened to me. i believe it's a miracle what happened to these other folks. if i had no media attention, it could have been less pain. in today's internet age, i could not imagine what it would be like to have all that recognition placed upon you and it would just be awful.

>> at first, she was like avoiding everyone. later on she started coming out to everyone. i don't know, i'm glad i got her out of her shell. >> bahia is going to visit her mother's grave for the first time since the accident happened. ironically, she's going to be flying out on the same date that she flew out two years before, and she's very frightened to be on a plane again after that. bahia, i miss my father, too. these things take time. these things take a lot of time. it's a good step going to visit your mother's grave and your wife's grave.

[ speaking french ]

>> do you have some scars? >> i was burned on my right hand, here. and this is later on, this is from sunburn. but here, this is the burn here. my face was burned. i had a cut on my forehead. [ speaking french ] >> here? >> what was that like being by yourself out there for nine hours? can you explain that? [ speaking french ]

>> she likes to go shopping with her. >> trying to remember your family is really a good thing to help heal. with my father, i try to remember my father in positive things. >> even though it makes you cry, it helps you move on.

[ speaking french ] >> when i saw bahia cry, that really made me sad. she lost like everything and her mom, and she's only 14. [ speaking french ]

>> thank you. >> can i say something? i love you guys. i feel very fortunate. >> bahia got me this necklace right here, and i got her the same one because her favorite color was pink. she has like the same characteristics as me. so it's like kind of weird seeing myself in her. bahia and her dad are really close, kind of like me and him. so it's ironic how we're both the same. >> i'm george. nice to meet you. >> i think of you as family now. i'm going to get it, i promise. i'm going to practice french.

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in the predawn darkness, the plane with 50 people on board began racing down the wrong runway. 11 seconds into the roll, the jet gathering speed, the copilot suspected trouble.

that is weird with no lights, he said. yeah, responded the captain. >> what they imply is, jesus christ, if he thought it was weird, they could have stopped at that point. why didn't he stop? it wasn't like, oh, my god, that's weird. it was, check that out. that is strange. >> when jim came in to -- when he flew into the airport two nights earlier, there were problems with the runway lights. the lights on the right side of the runway were not working. >> that night i made a comment to the captain, there are no lights lit up. how are we supposed to find the runway? it's like flying into a black hole, which we knew where we were and we had no issues or no problems coming in that night and flying and landing. but at the same time, i now already have a preconceived notion that there are no lights lit up to identify runways.

>> so they had several notices informing them there would be lights out on the runway, so they completely expected to see a dark runway. that's what they were told. if you walk into a room, and somebody said the lightbulb is out and you turn it on and the lamp doesn't come on, are you shocked? no, because i just told you the light's out. >> that's as big as you are tall. and i'm glad -- actually, i think god gave me a couple extra inches. because if i didn't have the reach, i would be in big trouble. the memorial, five years where they have a statue of the 49 doves, which was very well done. it is 49 birds taking off, upward motion, and they spread out. i'll show you a video of it. jesus. it affected everything, because everything that i knew that was

normal prior to august 27 was not normal anymore. just everything changed. and the first couple of years were probably not good years. >> he was just emotionally devastated. he still goes back. there's times he doesn't get out of bed for a week, even now. so it hits him like it was yesterday. >> just to getting acclimated to my new body was hard. ♪ >> i think i connected with bahia real closely, because she reminded me of you. she really liked you. the thing is, you know, when she bonded with you, i felt like she bonded with me. because you're part of me. >> yeah, the last time i talked to her, we were just saying we

miss each other and stuff. >> survivor's guilt is a monster. i still have not figured out how to completely absolve myself from that burden. >> there are so many people in one area in minneapolis-st. paul and the surrounding area that had people on this flight. >> i'm pretty sure it was here. i've been a little fearful of meeting relatives of this -- of this tragedy, because i was afraid that they would judge me, you know? being that i was the only one to walk away from this accident without loss of my life. i mean, there would be some high expectations of me to be

somebody i may not be. i love you. meeting up with other people that have lost people and are in our accident might help me out quite a bit. >> the hearing was -- to say it was a difficult day was just such an understatement. >> welcome to the boardroom of the national transportation safety board. >> we expected to hear that there was a certain amount of responsibility with the pilots. that's the way that it is. that's the way it goes. we were well prepared for that. what we did not expect is for there to be nothing else. >> the national transportation safety board determines the probable cause of this accident was the flight crew member's failure to use available cues and aids to identify the airplane's location. on the airport surface during taxi, and their failure to cross-check and verify that the

airplane was on the correct runway before takeoff. >> you could hear an audible gasp. most of the investigative team was sitting there, making eyes like, can you believe they just said that? >> they literally threw out all the directional information was wrong in the first five minutes. >> i scratch my head to understand, after the thousands of takeoffs that these men have done over the hours they have been flying how they couldn't see the difference at the moment they were beginning, as they lined up on the runway. >> they referred to them as these two cowboys, which just -- i mean, really? really? is that necessary? this is supposed to be a professional environment. that's how you talk? >> the ntsb actually put up two photos. one of what it looked like down runway 2-6 and one of what it looked like down runway 2-2, and actually had the audacity to make the comment. look at these two pictures. how could they have gotten it wrong?

i'm willing to bet if the crew had those two picture to choose from, they would have chose the right one. it was not a matter of choosing between two different choices, it was a matter of why they thought they were in the position they were. that should have been the focus. >> there were too many times that i really wanted to stand up and go, how can you say that? >> i listened to them dismiss the tower from the whole thing. i got up and walked out. i didn't know what to do. the fact that i couldn't say anything. i couldn't go wait a minute! none of us could say anything. you couldn't question anything. but i got up and i walked out. >> the ntsb is mandated by congress to find a cause of an accident. we're actually one of the last industrial nations that determine a single probable cause. >> when congress created us, one of the things that they asked us to do was to determine the probable cause. that's been a part of our statute for over 40 years. >> when you look at a complex

accident like this, you can't look at one individual thing, you have to look at the interactions. once we can put that term pilot error, it makes us feel better that we found what went wrong. we don't need to look any further. we have our scapegoat, and we can all take comfort in the system and move forward from here. >> if this person is bad and this person did a bad thing, if i just remove this person from the system, we would make it safer. we've gotten what we also typically term the low-hanging fruit. the easy stuff to fix. we can't take all the pilots out, so we need to move so that we can actually create real safety. human error is a symptom of something much deeper in the system that is not correct. until we recognize that, we're going to have a really hard time bettering the system. congress has to act and say, we will change our ntsb charter and we will say now you need to find the contributors rather than

going after a single cause. >> i do not think this accident was due to pilot error. this was a complex warning, and there were numerous little things that went wrong. and the margin of safety was eroded by all of them to the point where the system became brittle and broke. >> and i'm sorry for everyone who has that empty space at the table and that empty spot at a christmas tree. you're just sorry. sorry is just not a big enough word. >> i can honestly say to her, i'm sorry that she's had to live through what we've had to live through, because long and short, she lost somebody too. from th. it's how i look at life. especially now that i live with a higher risk of stroke due to afib, a type of irregular heartbeat not caused by a heart valve problem. i was taking warfarin

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do you know if this is an experimental plane? it's getting ready to take off. but these others, they're just experimental planes. >> that's not good. that one in the white. >> at a certain speed, we pulled

back on another piece of equipment, and the next thing you know, we're off the ground and we're flying, which i just believe is a gift that has been given to us. it is feasible to be in a wheelchair, to still be able to fly as long as you have met all the requirements the faa has required of you. medical and then equipment and stuff like that. but no, my commercial aviation career is pretty much done. >> hey, it's me. yeah, i'm coming up to minneapolis. i'll be up there in about a month. december right after christmas.

i'm driving home for christmas the first time in 22 years. i always felt a little hole in myself when i thought about family meetings during the holidays. it's hard, and on top of that, i'm going to meet victims' families. the last time i spoke to somebody that was a victim or had a family member pass away in the accident was back in 1987. i'm afraid that if i -- if i showed myself to the person and i could upset them more than they already are. i didn't jump out of the gates and make a success out of my life right away. i thought they would be angry for me, because their family members may have rebounded quicker or made their life better quicker.

i just didn't know how to deal with the judgment of somebody that was in grief. no matter how bad your situation is, it's always somebody else that has it worse than you. and i think it's important that people reach out to one another and help each other out. >> well, i'm dan monroe. it's nice to meet you. >> good morning. >> well, i'm dan monroe. and my mom and dad, dave and arlene monroe, were both on the flight and died simultaneously in the crash. this is my wife, sue, who i met four months after the crash. >> you live in the twin cities? or chicago? >> i live in reno. >> oh, you live in reno. >> i've been there for 20 years. >> you went out there and stayed out there. >> i stayed out there. >> do you ever drive on that highway that you landed on? >> yes. but i remember waking up at 5:00 when my alarm went off on that

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hello, sarah. >> hi, gorge. it's nice to meet you. >> nice to meet you, too. >> i was so young. i was 6. there was quite a bit i didn't know at the time, even so. you know, i always thought that my path would cross with george's, and that we would have the opportunity to talk. my parents and my grandparents were on the galaxy crash. >> you know, i'm so happy to see you, george. >> likewise. how are you? >> i wish i had had the courage to come to you 20 years ago. >> well, i'm glad you're here now. >> thank you. >> and my husband, bill, was on the plane. >> for my 21st birthday, my dad took me to a dude ranch, and this is out on the front porch of that dude ranch. >> this was out of my dad's wallet.

here's another one of them. >> he had this with him on the -- >> uh-huh. >> -- on the plane? i wish i just could say, ah, i remember. >> there was a lot of people on the plane. and you would have maybe gotten close to a few. >> i know i interacted with just about everybody on that plane in one way or the other. and going forward to sunday, that was super bowl sunday, and we ended up watching the game in the theater at caesar's palace. and everybody is laughing and we're having a good time. we drove in and headed into the terminal, and spirits were high, you know. a little tired, you know. it was getting close to 1:00 in the morning west coast time. i got on the plane, i took the first seat i could get, sat down, dad sat next to me, and not too long after that, two guys come up to us and say hey, you're in our seats. and my dad didn't take no for an

answer very good or didn't like confrontation, so he would stand up to people. but his initial and only reaction was, yeah, no problem. we'll get up for you. it was just totally weird. i didn't want to get up. i was like, come on. you let these guys push us around? he said no, let's get up and go. >> did you all have assigned seats at that time? >> no, it was free seating. >> how hard was the impact? do you remember that? >> i do. but i only have my point of view. i mean, it was sudden. i'm extremely flexible, so i was able to put my legs up as high as i could to protect my face from going into the wall that was in front of me. i did everything i could to live. i wanted to live. i think everybody else on the plane did too. by some miracle i ended up

flying out onto the street and i thought i was -- i thought i was in heaven. that i died. and then i turned my head and i saw a billboard. i said, i'm not dead, i've got to get up. >> you know, i question what now? who is my family? you know, where do i go? how do i -- you know? >> so for you then, you just struggle with survivor guilt? >> later that year, they dropped a ton of money in my lap and said here you go. this is for the loss of your father. i was all of a sudden happy again, because i could focus on having fun rather than thinking

about what happened and what my promise was. i mean, that was in the back of my head the whole time. i made a promise to god that i was going to do good and be a force of his will. >> but really, what's to judge? i mean you -- you survived. >> and i just can't imagine him judging you. everybody is very glad to see that 17-year-old boy smiling. >> when i was sitting in those news conferences with a big grin on my face, what were you thinking? >> you're probably happy to be alive. >> good. >> you should be. >> that's what i was feeling. >> not in our house. you would proceed that way. >> shine a bright light on a very hard time. >> it's very good to see you. >> i just, you know, your dad would have been glad to see his kid made it.

>> when i come to minnesota, one thing i always try to do is pay my respects to my father. the reason why i moved to reno is because the last place i saw my father alive, my father meant a lot to me and just being close to where he was kind of gives me comfort to know that i'm there with him. >> we're out at keeneland, which is right across the street from the airport where the accident occurred. keeneland has always been a big part of my mom's life because of the horses she dealt with. her and her sister would come

out here during the meets and the sales and just sit there and watch the horses all day long. she back in her earlier years took her horse and snuck in on the track and took her horse for a lap. upon doing it, one of the guards or maintenance men caught her and threatened to take her horse. and my aunt said she put up a fight saying they weren't going to take her horse from her. from what i gathered, i'm thinking she jumped over the rail. she couldn't have snuck in any other way. so she got her horse through the railing and took it for the full mile and a half lap around this track. and for her, i say that was probably a highlight in her life.

>> he had the most fatalistic attitude. it was all about a death wish. angry, angry, angry. and wouldn't get out of bed. we call it going over to the dark side. he was over in the dark side much more than ever the light side. >> if i'm not doing something and i'm not involved with an activity, my mind goes back to august 27, 2006, because there are a lot of why questions that are not answered. and probably will never get answered just because. so i just continually, with my wife's support, do things that i'm actively involved with that have my mind on that instead of on the accident. >> i always tried to look for things for him to do, the biking, the whatever. and then it got to where we were in florida, there was nothing --

he got the bike, the shine kind of wore off. and i see the skiing thing, the adaptability skiing thing, and i made the reservation before he could say no. we were there five days. that is the happiest, longest period of time he's been happy in five years. it was amazing to watch. and i said, that's it. that's the ticket. went home, put the house on the market and that's why we're here. so we're talking five months out of almost six years that he finally has a reason to get up every day. >> regardless of how catastrophic one's event might be, you can still push forward. my goal is to go to the paralympics. so to have this goal in front of me, it's a feeling you can't describe. i've taken steps and strived to go forward.

i don't want to destroy my marriage and i don't want to destroy me. and i want to be a role model for other people that are at that crossroads and might not have hope, might not have the belief that things will get better. [ coughs, sneezes ]

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two days after my trip to france, bahia took off and flew to the islands from paris, and she was able to fulfill what she wanted to do and she didn't let her fears get the best of her. ♪ >> the media has kind of quieted down over the years.

usually around maybe at the beginning of august every year, i kind of maybe get an e-mail or a phone call or something. my family was really cautious about keeping the media away and keeping my life private, because there's so much that could go wrong with being in the spotlight. ♪ >> they may not get it this year, but they're in the top of the city. she earned her way on the team, too. all these girls that are on it are pretty much have been

together for a while. >> go away, dad! >> his depression has gone away quite a bit. he's actually like opening up and not closing everything in a bottle anymore. >> this 27th anniversary of the accident felt very different than others because i was able to communicate with so many people that i haven't communicated with before. because i've been separated from the others. these people made me feel as though i was part of a community, and that was something that burdened me for years, because i was afraid that i would be judged harshly for not making the most of my life. >> his diet has changed a lot. he's been losing a lot of weight. he's focusing more on his goals, his life-long goals and taking care of me. i think he feels more happy.

he's not holding in anymore, you know? he's like not in his own hell. >> george, one of the other sole survivors is coming over. i haven't met him yet, and anticipating that, just to see if we have any differences, any opinions. just what's on his mind, what's on my mind. >> i'm really hoping the olympic thing happens. i don't care if it's on the moon. >> it's almost a job-type feeling biblical wise. everything was taken from him, everything.

he always had his faith, always had his belief, more positiveness than negativity. because the negativity can just suck you in. >> i've been there.