A flight attendant who survived a fall from 10,000 meters. "The safest place is in the middle of the plane." Last hours before disaster

Vesna Vulovic dies in Belgrade after being the sole survivor of the Yugoslav Airlines bombing German city Hermsdorf in 1972. Then she fell from a 10-kilometer height and remained alive.

The stewardess received numerous fractures and injuries, she was paralyzed in the lower part of her body, she spent several days in a coma, but in the end she managed to fully recover. In 1985, Vulovich entered the Guinness Book of Records as the holder of the world record for the height among survivors of a free fall without a parachute.

According to the Serbian publication Večernje novosti, a 67-year-old woman was found dead in a bathroom at her home on December 23. The cause of death is not known, but the publication indicates that Vulovich had health problems.

January 26, 1972 DC-9-32 Jugoslovenski Aerotransport (JAT, international name- Yugoslav Airlines) flew on the route Stockholm - Copenhagen - Zagreb - Belgrade on the Copenhagen - Zagreb section. There were 28 people on board, including 5 crew members, including stewardess Vesna Vulovich, and 23 passengers. Takeoff, climb and access to the airway took place as usual. The flight took place at an altitude of about 10 thousand meters.

An hour after takeoff, the DC-9 passed another route point: the Hermsdorf drive radio station in East Germany and took up a height of 10,160 meters. Shortly thereafter, the aircraft unexpectedly collapsed, the cockpit separated from the main body. The wreckage fell near the village of Serbska Kamenice in Czechoslovakia (now the territory of the Czech Republic). Large parts of the fuselage were at a distance of no more than a kilometer from each other, while usually the destruction on high altitude lead to significant fragmentation.

According to the official investigation, before the crash, all aircraft systems were operating normally, the pilots were in their places. The subsequent examination did not find alcohol, narcotic or other substances in their blood. The pilots did not transmit distress signals or messages about breakdowns to the ground. In addition, the aircraft was practically new, it began to operate less than a year before the disaster.

The cause of the disaster was called an explosion in the luggage compartment of the aircraft, located in front of the fuselage. Service state security Czechoslovakia, 10 days after the tragedy, presented parts of an alarm clock, which, according to it, was part of an explosive mechanism. Followers of the Croatian ultra-right organization "Ustashi" were considered a possible organizer of the attack. However, officially the crime remained unsolved, and the names of the perpetrators were not established.

22-year-old flight attendant Vesna Vulović was originally not supposed to fly on this flight, but due to an airline error, was assigned to it instead by another flight attendant with the same name (Vesna Nikolic). By the time of the disaster, Vesna had not yet completed her studies and was in the crew as a trainee flight attendant.

On December 23, 2016, at the age of 66, the legendary stewardess Vesna Vulovich died, who in 1972 was present at the explosion in the cabin of the aircraft, and then fell along with the debris from a height of 10 km.

She received numerous fractures and injuries, fell into a coma for several days, but then recovered, entered the Guinness Book of Records and became a world celebrity.

On January 26, 1972, 22-year-old Vesna Vulovich flew from Stockholm to Belgrade by plane McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32 of Yugoslav Airlines. When the plane flew over the German Hersdorf, he disappeared from the radar, and 46 minutes after takeoff exploded in the air. It is assumed that the bomb was carried on board by Croatian nationalists - the Ustashe. Debris fell near the village of Serbska Kamenice in Czechoslovakia.

Of the 28 people on board, only Vulovich survived. As a result of the fall, she received fractures of the base of the skull, three vertebrae, both legs and the pelvis, spent several days in a coma, but then woke up and first of all asked for a cigarette. Interestingly, by mistake of the airline, the girl got on the flight instead of another stewardess with the same name (Vesny Nikolic). By the time of the disaster, the flight attendant had not yet completed her training and was in the crew as a trainee.

What saved Vulovich, who spent three minutes in free fall? Perhaps the fact that she was squeezed in the tail of the plane, between the corpses and pieces of luggage. In addition, pine branches and a thick layer of snow softened the blow.

Her cries in the forest were heard by the forester Bruno Henke, who during the Second World War was a doctor in the German army. He helped the girl hold out until the arrival of medical help.

Vulovich spent 10 months with paralysis of her lower body (from the waist to her legs). After that, she was treated for another six months, but then recovered and even asked to fly again on flights with JAT. She was turned down and instead given a job at the airline's office.

Such fearlessness is explained by the fact that Vesna did not remember either the accident or her salvation. In a 2008 interview, she admitted that she only remembers how she greeted passengers after taking off from Copenhagen, and then how she woke up in the hospital and saw her mother.

Vulovich became a national heroine: she was given a reception by Marshal Tito, which was then considered a great honor for a citizen of Yugoslavia. Songs were dedicated to the woman and she was invited to the most popular television shows. It became popular to name girls after a flight attendant who survived, as if it brought them good luck.

Vesna Vulovich used her fame for political purposes: she protested against the power of Slobodan Milosevic, and later campaigned for one of the parties in the elections.

The peak of international fame Vulovich came in 1985, when she was invited to London on behalf of the Guinness Book of Records. There, Vulovich received an award as a person who survived a fall without a parachute from maximum height. The prize was presented to the woman by musician Paul McCartney, the idol of her youth.
Vesna said that she was just as much a “survivor” as the other inhabitants of Serbia: “We Serbs are truly survivors. We have lived through communism, Tito, war, poverty, NATO bombings, sanctions and Milosevic. We just want a normal life."

On December 23, Vesna Vulović was found dead at her home in Belgrade after the police broke into the woman's apartment at the request of her friends, who were alarmed that she was not answering her calls. The cause of death is unknown, but, according to Vulovich's friends, her health is beyond Lately reeled.

Vesna Vulovich was born on January 3, 1950. January 26, 1972. In the air above the city of Serbska Kamenice (then Czechoslovakia), a passenger plane of Yugoslav Airlines shattered from a bomb explosion planted by terrorists. The airliner followed the route from Copenhagen to Belgrade. All 29 passengers and crew members on board were killed. Or rather, almost everything. Only 22-year-old stewardess Vesna Vulovich survived - having fallen to the ground from a height of 10,160 meters (!), She miraculously survived. Her case was

so unique that the girl was listed in the Guinness Book of Records.

NEVER flew.

.

-Do doctors give any explanation for your survival? I have always had very low blood pressure. When a person abruptly finds himself at a high altitude, where there is no oxygen at all, he dies almost immediately - his heart breaks. After the explosion, I lost consciousness - this, coupled with low pressure, saved me from a quick death in the air. But why I remained intact, falling to the ground, I myself do not know. I have always played sports, the body was flexible, bent in any direction - probably because of this I received fewer fractures than I could.- There is another version that the snow-covered crowns of trees "held" pieces of the aircraft.- No, there was no snow at all then - it fell later. It is very good that a local resident, the German Bruno, who served in the Wehrmacht during the war, soon stumbled upon the wreckage of the airliner. He found that I had a weak pulse and gave first aid. He did everything very correctly - for example, he did not try to move my body, noticing that my spine was broken. If it weren't for Bruno, we wouldn't be sitting here with you.- Were the injuries serious?- Still would! I broke my left arm and leg, three vertebrae (one of them was simply crushed), I broke my skull in several places. And after that, there are people who smile sweetly and say: “Oh, you are lucky. How lucky you are!” I hate that word.- Why?- If I was really lucky, I would not have got on this plane at all. And so I fell from heaven, broke all my bones, lost my memory, learned to walk for four and a half years, and at the same time they envy me! Yeah - great luck, nothing

say. "The place of the fall is very important."

-How did you react to miraculous salvation your family?- They believed that Saint George saved me: he was considered our family patron. When I was very young, my maternal grandmother baptized me in a church - secretly, because my parents were communists. And when the plane crash happened, my grandmother said to my father: “You see! You said that there is no God, but I baptized Spring - and she survived. My father was impressed - he began to believe in God, he left the Communist Party. And you know what I'll tell you? In the event of a plane crash, it is very important to choose a place where exactly to fall (laughs). Czech medicine was already better than ours thirty years ago. Heated floors in the wards for patients: there is still no such thing in Belgrade.- Did you feel any anxiety before THAT flight?- No, absolutely. My whole January was so disgusting, and this day just turned out to be fun. But the crew members, on the contrary, were very gloomy, did not smile. The captain flatly refused to go into the city and locked himself in his room for a whole day. One person from our team said to me: “I feel something will happen tomorrow.”- That is, it remains in your head - you are standing at the gangway of the plane, then bam - and you wake up in the hospital, all in bandages. What was the first thing you thought about?- I saw my mother and father and was terribly surprised. “What happened, why are you here and where am I myself? Where are you taking my dog ​​and my cat?” My memory then lived exactly one day - the next morning I again forgot everything and asked my parents the same questions: for a whole month in a row. I did not distinguish whether it was day or night now - in general, everything was vague. When the memory returned, a feeling of guilt came: my God, all my colleagues died, but I remained alive ... what a shame. For a while I wished I had died with them.

BY THE WAY There are only dozens of cases in the world when people, having fallen from a great height, remained alive. Most of them are in the second world war: then thousands of planes were shot down.● In 1942, the pilot of the downed IL-4 Ivan Chisov fell from a height of 7000 meters - he fell into a ravine full of snow, which saved his life.● In March 1944, the plane of the Englishman Nicholas Elkimeid was shot down over Germany. Having fallen from a height of 5000 meters into the trees, he was not injured. ● In August 1981, on Far East An-24 passenger plane and Tu-16 bomber collided. Having fallen in a chair from a height of 5000 meters, Larisa Savitskaya survived: she was found in the taiga. “I attract death to me” - You didn't ask yourself the questions: "why me?" and "how?"?“Things like this happen to me all the time. In addition to the plane crash, I was on the verge of death seven or eight times. The first time - at the age of 12, when I was resting on sea ​​beach in Montenegro. I'm floating on an air mattress, and then a shark swims up to him. I'm shocked - where did she come from? There spawned no predatory fish were found. But it turned out that this shark was following one large ship from afar and reached our shores. The shark was driven away, I was rescued. The second time - I argued with my mentally ill neighbor about politics. The man took out a knife and rushed at me. She ran away. In the third - I had an ectopic pregnancy, a severe case. However, the doctors pumped out. Apparently, I attract death to me, but at the last moment someone unknown takes away trouble.- Have the terrorists who planted the bomb on your airliner been arrested?- Their names were established, but they could not be found abroad: the "Croatian National Movement" took responsibility for the explosion. In 1991, these militants returned to Yugoslavia to participate in civil war and all died, except for one person who went to Argentina. People often ask me: did God punish them? I don't know.- After a long treatment, you returned to work at Yugoslav Airlines, worked in the main office. Is it true that you were categorically forbidden to fly?- Yes. I don't know why, but I was turned down to be a flight attendant again. It seemed that my mere presence on board would be a good advertisement that the plane will never fall: a shell does not hit the same funnel twice. However, officials are officials: they wanted the catastrophe to be forgotten as soon as possible. Officially, I didn’t fly anymore - only as a tourist. “The safest thing is in the middle of the plane” - What do you think is the safest place to fly?- Well, if you take my case, then this is the middle of the fuselage - it was there that they found me among the wreckage. But everyone seems to know that the most dangerous thing is to sit in the "nose" of an airliner. Although, if you constantly think about disasters, “wind up” yourself, then you don’t need to fly at all. On TV around the clock exaggerated - bin Laden, kamikaze terrorists, explosives. Previously, such cases were rare, but now they have become the norm. Even I catch myself thinking: how would I feel now on an airplane? You wave your hand - oh, no, it's better to go by train. However, I have not been sitting in the cabin of an airliner for a long time - my pension is $ 400, of which I pay half for an apartment: with such income, there is no time for flying.- Your salvation has become widely known throughout the world, and in your native Yugoslavia, unprecedented glory fell upon you. So she didn't bring you anything?- No. What is popularity? As a result, it leads to the fact that some people begin to hate you - just like that, out of the blue. Once I was standing at a bus stop, waiting for a bus: I see one person is reading a newspaper with an interview with me. And nearby, two women are angrily discussing: no, you look, this Spring again, fu-you, well, you have nowhere to go from it. I got angry and did not communicate with journalists for ten years in a row. Oh no, there is still one plus: in London, while receiving the Guinness Book of Records prize, I met my idol - Paul McCartney! I asked him for an autograph, and he said: of course, but first you, Spring, give me your autograph! I heard you weren't even allowed to attend the ceremony at first...- Right. The organizers expected that a woman who had fallen from heaven would arrive in a wheelchair, all broken, on crutches, and here I come on my own legs, they did not recognize me. True, it was very difficult at the reception. I was dressed in a cheap silk dress for a hundred dollars and was afraid to sit down - everything would crumble from behind. Spent 10 hours on my feet. The Belgian queen approached me and kindly asked why I did not sit down. I say: yes, it will be uncomfortable with the dress. She told me: I’m supposedly in an even worse position, my dress costs ten thousand, but I still can’t sit down - it’s not supposed to be according to etiquette! I'm amazed that after THIS you can walk, just a little limp.- You should always be an optimist. I am stubborn in life. The doctors said: “Your spine is broken, say thank you for staying alive, you will never be able to walk,” I argued: “Nothing like that - I want to go and go.” And so it happened, I got to my feet on the day of St. Sava - this is the main saint of Serbia. Since then, every anniversary of this event, I come to the temple to thank Savva for the healing. Until recently, I felt more or less normal: for 8 years I did not go to the medical center for exercises for the spine, but now the broken bones began to hurt, they react to the weather. Can you smell my perfume? They are called "Miracle". Well, what else could save me when falling from 10,000 meters, except for a miracle? I shouldn't have survived, all the doctors say. But I am sitting in front of you. So this is fate.- I knew that at the end of the interview you would say: “Now I believe in fate.”"Wouldn't you believe me if you were me?"

Chances of surviving similar disasters are negligible, and usually messages about them end with the same phrase: "All on board died." But this time, a sensation spread around the world - twenty-two-year-old stewardess Vesna Vulovich, having fallen from a great height, remained alive. A relatively “soft” landing was “provided” by the snow-covered crowns of trees, which softened the blow. True, the girl came to herself only a month later.

Vesna Vulovich became a stewardess by accident. After graduating from high school, she entered the university. Like many young people of that generation, the girl was fascinated by the songs of the Beatles and, in order to understand her idols, she went to study at the English department. After the first course, Vesna went on an internship to England. And after returning there was a meeting that dramatically changed her life. One of Vesna's school friends, who by that time had become a pilot, flew on planes of the Yugoslav company JAT. It was he who advised the girl to master the specialty of an international airline stewardess, so that once a month she could visit London so beloved by her. And financially, this work was a good help for the student. And in 1971, Spring first rose into the sky ...

On January 25, 1972, the crew, in which Vulovich trained, arrived in Copenhagen, where he was supposed to change the pilots who drove the plane from Stockholm. As Vesna later recalled, she got the impression that her more experienced colleagues seemed to have a premonition of something - they talked a lot about their families, bought souvenirs. Shortly before takeoff, the girl drew attention to one of the workers who was loading luggage onto the plane. Outwardly, he looked like a native of Balkan Peninsula, and his behavior contrasted sharply with the work of other loaders - he fussed, spoke loudly. Vulovich believes that it was he who planted the bomb on the plane. But this thought came much later - when she woke up in the hospital.

Spring was lucky not only that the plane fell on snow-covered trees, but also that the first on the scene of the accident was one of the local residents, who during the Second World War worked in a German field hospital and knew how to provide first aid. medical care. It was he who discovered the barely breathing stewardess among the dead bodies of passengers and helped her. It probably saved the girl's life. But the doctors did not believe for a long time that she would survive. Even when Spring came to her senses, they doubted it. But the days passed, and the young body more and more confidently coped with the injuries.

Two months after the accident, Vulović was sent by plane from Prague to Belgrade. There were fears that the flight could negatively affect the girl's mental state - after all, a fall from such a height could not pass without a trace. Fortunately, everything turned out well - Spring did not remember anything from the events of that terrible day and therefore did not react in any way to the new flight. She was not afraid to fly and subsequently. And in the Belgrade hospital, a policeman was constantly on duty at the entrance to her ward - the authorities feared that Croatian terrorists would try to deal with a dangerous witness: Vulovich was the only one who saw the alleged criminal and gave his description. By the way, it is not known whether they managed to arrest him or not - the miraculous rescue overshadowed all the other details of that catastrophe. This incident was even entered into the Guinness Book of Records as the highest jump without a parachute.

Curious detail. When Vesna arrived in London for the ceremony of presenting a certificate of entry into the Book of Records, Paul McCartney, the idol of her youth, received a similar document at the same time.

In September 1972, Vulovich was discharged from the hospital. She was forbidden to fly, but she continued to work for the JAT airline - she was engaged in the execution of cargo contracts. Own workplace Spring left after eighteen years due to disagreement with the policies of the then Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic.

In 1977, Vesna Vulovich got married and lived happily married for fifteen years. Then, as she herself says, she also “happily” divorced. That's just children Spring was never able to acquire.

Two journalists in Prague investigated legendary history 36 years ago, when the Yugoslav flight attendant Vesna Vulovich (she was then 22 years old) miraculously survived after falling from a height of 10 thousand meters. According to the Yugoslav government, the plane was blown up over the territory of Czechoslovakia by Croatian nationalists, but Peter Hornung and Pavel Teiner believe that this story was fabricated by the communists to cover up a mistake.

The plane of the Yugoslav Airlines, flying JU 367, crashed on January 26, 1972 near the village of Serbska Kamenice (present-day Czech Republic). Vesna Vulovich was the only one who managed to survive this catastrophe, which claimed the lives of 27 people. In 1985, she got into the Guinness Book of Records for surviving a fall without a parachute from a record height.

However, Prague journalists, based on classified documents of the Czech civil aviation, claim that the plane was shot down at a lower altitude, and not by Croatian nationalists, but by the Czechoslovak Air Force. This was done by mistake, and to hide it, the secret police invented a version of a fall from a record height, InoPressa.ru reports citing The Guardian.

Journalists say that, apparently, the plane deviated from the course due to malfunctions. According to Hornung, "He started a sharp decline and ended up next to a secret military zone” - just a two-minute flight from a nuclear weapons storage. According to the investigation, the plane fell apart at an altitude of about 800 meters, and not 10,000, as officially stated.

In favor of the theory that the plane was mistaken for a source of military threat is the fact that at the time of the incident, Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev and his colleague from the GDR Erich Honecker were allegedly in the air, returning from a conference in Prague.

According to the official version, Vulovich was in the tail section of the aircraft at the time of the crash, but eyewitnesses repeatedly mentioned that she was found in its middle part, in the area of ​​​​the wings.

In addition, residents of the village of Serbska Kamenice said they saw the plane not yet damaged, but on fire, and it was below the edge of the clouds. Only then did it explode. Eyewitnesses also claim that another plane was in the sky at that moment.

The story is still a mystery, the plane's black boxes have never been found.

Vulovich herself does not remember anything about the disaster. After the fall, her skull was damaged, her legs and three vertebrae were broken. She was temporarily paralyzed, but then was able to return to normal life and became a national heroine of Yugoslavia. Vulovich again returned to aviation, and was fired only in 1990 - for participating in demonstrations against Slobodan Milosevic.

According to the newspaper, there are rumors that she was not arrested only because she was already a legendary figure and a national heroine.

Now 59-year-old Vesna Vulovic lives in Belgrade and is involved in politics, protesting against Serbian nationalism. Last summer, in an interview with The New York Times, she said of herself: “I’m like a cat… I have nine lives. But if the nationalists win in this country, my heart will break.”

The airliner followed the route from Copenhagen to Belgrade. All 29 passengers and crew on board were killed. Or rather, almost everything. Only 22-year-old survived stewardess Vesna Vulovich- having fallen to the ground from a height of 10,160 meters (!), she miraculously survived. Her case was so unique that the girl was listed in the Guinness Book of Records.

"I hate the word" lucky "

Georgy Zotov,"AIF": It's amazing how you weren't afraid to fly after that plane crash. In my opinion, having survived this, you won’t even approach the plane for a cannon shot.

Vesna Vulovich: I have nothing to be afraid of - I practically do not remember anything: my memory stopped an hour before the flight. I remember how the cleaner cleaned the plane, I remember the women passengers standing in line for boarding ... They said that they were with children, but I didn’t remember the children. No fear remained even in the subconscious. When, two months after the fall, I was transported by plane from Prague to Belgrade, the doctors were going to give me an injection of sleeping pills: they say, otherwise there will be hysteria during the flight. I was indignant - what are you, I like to fly! Memories of the explosion on board came back unexpectedly. It happened 10 years ago. The boys set fire to firecrackers in the street in New Year's celebration. And suddenly I immediately remembered: a loud sound - BOOM! - unbearably bright light and cold ...

- They say you were not supposed to fly on that plane at all?

Yes. It feels like fate is playing with me. The person who was in charge of the flight lists was wrong. Me and another stewardess were named Vesna. And he put instead of "Spring Nikolic" - "Spring Vulovich", an accidental mistake. After the plane crash, flight attendant Nikolic quit: she NEVER flew again in her life.

- Doctors give some explanation for the fact that you survived?

I have always had very low blood pressure. When a person abruptly finds himself at a high altitude, where there is no oxygen at all, he dies almost immediately - his heart breaks. After the explosion, I lost consciousness - this, coupled with low pressure, saved me from a quick death in the air. But why I remained intact, falling to the ground, I myself do not know. I have always played sports, the body was flexible, bent in any direction - probably because of this I received fewer fractures than I could.

- There is another version that the snow-covered crowns of trees "held" pieces of the plane.

No, there was no snow at all then - it fell later. It is very good that a local resident, the German Bruno, who served in the Wehrmacht during the war, soon stumbled upon the wreckage of the airliner. He found that I had a weak pulse and gave first aid. He did everything very correctly - for example, he did not try to move my body, noticing that my spine was broken. If it weren't for Bruno, we wouldn't be here with you.

- Were the injuries serious?

Still would! I broke my left arm and leg, three vertebrae (one of them was simply crushed), I broke my skull in several places. And after that, there are people who smile sweetly and say: “Oh, you are lucky. How lucky you are!” I hate this word.

- Why?

If I had been really lucky, I would not have got on this plane at all. And so I fell from heaven, broke all my bones, lost my memory, learned to walk for four and a half years, and at the same time they envy me! Yeah - great luck, nothing to say.

"The place of the fall is very important"

How did your family react to the miraculous rescue?

They believed that Saint George had saved me: he was considered our family patron. When I was very young, my maternal grandmother baptized me in a church - secretly, because my parents were communists. And when the plane crash happened, my grandmother said to my father: “You see! You said that there is no God, but I baptized Spring - and she survived. My father was impressed - he began to believe in God, he left the Communist Party. And you know what I'll tell you? In the event of a plane crash, it is very important to choose a place where exactly to fall (laughs). Czech medicine was already better than ours thirty years ago. There are heated floors in the wards for patients: there is still no such thing in Belgrade.

- Did you feel any anxiety before THAT flight?

No, absolutely. My whole January was so disgusting, and this day just turned out to be fun. But the crew members, on the contrary, were very gloomy, did not smile. The captain flatly refused to go into the city and locked himself in his room for a whole day. One person from our team said to me: "I feel something will happen tomorrow."

That is, it remains in your head - you are standing at the gangway of the plane, then bam - and you wake up in the hospital, all in bandages. What was the first thing you thought about?

I saw my mother and father and was terribly surprised. “What happened, why are you here and where am I myself? Where are you taking my dog ​​and my cat?” My memory then lived exactly one day - the next morning I again forgot everything and asked my parents the same questions: for a whole month in a row. I did not distinguish whether it was day or night now - in general, everything was vague. When the memory returned, a feeling of guilt came: my God, all my colleagues died, but I remained alive ... what a shame. For a while I wished I had died with them.

BY THE WAY

There are only dozens of cases in the world when people, having fallen from a great height, remained alive. Most of them fall on the Second World War: then the planes were shot down by the thousands.

● In 1942, Ivan Chisov, the pilot of a downed IL-4, fell from a height of 7,000 meters - he fell into a ravine full of snow, which saved his life.

● In March 1944, the plane of the Englishman Nicholas Elkimeid was shot down over Germany. Having collapsed from a height of 5000 meters into the trees, he was not injured.

● In August 1981, an An-24 passenger plane and a Tu-16 bomber collided in the Far East. Having fallen in a chair from a height of 5000 meters, Larisa Savitskaya survived: she was found in the taiga.

"I attract death to me"

- You did not ask yourself the questions: “why me?” and "how?"?

These things happen to me all the time. In addition to the plane crash, I was on the verge of death seven or eight times. The first time - at the age of 12, when I was relaxing on the sea beach in Montenegro. I'm floating on an air mattress, and then a shark swims up to him. I'm shocked - where did she come from? There spawned no predatory fish were found. But it turned out that this shark followed one large ship from afar and reached our shores. The shark was driven away, I was rescued. The second time - I argued with my mentally ill neighbor about politics. The man took out a knife and rushed at me. She ran away. In the third - I had an ectopic pregnancy, a severe case. However, the doctors pumped out. Apparently, I attract death to me, but at the last moment, someone unknown takes away trouble.

- Have the terrorists who planted the bomb on your airliner been arrested?

Their names were established, but they could not be found abroad: the Croatian National Movement claimed responsibility for the explosion. In 1991, these fighters returned to Yugoslavia to fight in the civil war and all died, except for one person who went to Argentina. People often ask me: did God punish them? I don't know.

After a long treatment, you returned to work at Yugoslav Airlines, worked in the main office. Is it true that you were categorically forbidden to fly?

Yes. I don't know why, but I was turned down to be a flight attendant again. It seemed that my mere presence on board would be a good advertisement that the plane will never fall: a shell does not hit the same funnel twice. However, officials are officials: they wanted the catastrophe to be forgotten as soon as possible. Officially, I no longer flew - only as a tourist.

"The safest place is in the middle of the plane"

What do you think is the safest place to fly?

Well, if you take my case, then this is the middle of the fuselage - it was there that they found me among the wreckage. But everyone seems to know that the most dangerous thing is to sit in the "nose" of an airliner. Although, if you constantly think about disasters, “wind up” yourself, then you don’t need to fly at all. On TV around the clock exaggerated - bin Laden, kamikaze terrorists, explosives. Previously, such cases were rare, but now they have become the norm. Even I catch myself thinking: how would I feel now on an airplane? You wave your hand - oh, no, it's better to go by train. However, I have not been sitting in the cabin of an airliner for a long time - my pension is $ 400, of which I pay half for an apartment: with such income, there is no time for flying.

Your salvation has become widely known throughout the world, and in your native Yugoslavia, unprecedented glory fell upon you. So she didn't bring you anything?

No. What is popularity? As a result, it leads to the fact that some people begin to hate you - just like that, out of the blue. Once I was standing at a bus stop, waiting for a bus: I see one person is reading a newspaper with an interview with me. And nearby, two women are angrily discussing: no, you look, this Spring again, fu-you, well, you have nowhere to go from it. I got angry and did not communicate with journalists for ten years in a row. Oh no, there is still one plus: in London, while receiving the Guinness Book of Records prize, I met my idol - Paul McCartney! I asked him for an autograph, and he said: of course, but first you, Spring, give me your autograph!

“I heard you weren’t even allowed to attend the ceremony at first…”

Right. The organizers expected that a woman who had fallen from heaven would arrive in a wheelchair, all broken, on crutches, and here I come on my own legs, they did not recognize me. True, it was very difficult at the reception. I was dressed in a cheap silk dress for a hundred dollars and was afraid to sit down - everything would crumble from behind. Spent 10 hours on my feet. The Belgian queen approached me and kindly asked why I did not sit down. I say: yes, it will be uncomfortable with the dress. She told me: I’m supposedly in an even worse position, my dress costs ten thousand, but I still can’t sit down - it’s not supposed to be according to etiquette!

- I'm amazed that after SUCH you can walk, just a little limp.

You should always be an optimist. I am stubborn in life. The doctors said: “Your spine is broken, say thank you for staying alive, you will never be able to walk,” I argued: “Nothing like that - I want to go and go.” And so it happened, I got to my feet on the day of St. Sava - this is the main saint of Serbia. Since then, every anniversary of this event, I come to the temple to thank Savva for the healing. Until recently, I felt more or less normal: for 8 years I did not go to the medical center for exercises for the spine, but now the broken bones began to hurt, they react to the weather. Can you smell my perfume? They are called "Miracle". Well, what else could save me when falling from 10,000 meters, except for a miracle? I shouldn't have survived, all the doctors say. But I am sitting in front of you. So this is destiny.

- I knew that at the end of the interview you would say: “Now I believe in fate.”

Wouldn't you believe me if you were me?

Flying faces

Vesna Vulovich (Vesna Vulović, Vesna Vuloviћ) is a former flight attendant and employee of the airline Jugoslovenski Aerotransport - JAT.
She was born on January 3, 1950. Celebrates second birthdayJanuary 26. In that 1972 DC-9-32 Jugoslovenski Aerotransport (JAT - Yugoslav Airlines) flew on the route Stockholm - Copenhagen - Zagreb - Belgrade on the Copenhagen - Zagreb section. There were 28 people on board, including 5 crew members. Takeoff, climb and access to the airway took place in the usual mode. The flight took place at an altitude of about 10 thousand meters.

An hour after takeoff, the DC-9 passed another route point: the Hermsdorf drive radio station in East Germany and took a height of 10,160 meters. Shortly thereafter, the aircraft unexpectedly collapsed, the cockpit separated from the main body. The wreckage fell near the village of Serbska Kamenice in Czechoslovakia (now the territory of the Czech Republic). Large parts of the fuselage were at a distance of no more than a kilometer from each other, while usually destruction at high altitude leads to a significant dispersion of debris.

According to the official investigation, before the crash, all aircraft systems were operating normally, the pilots were in their places. The subsequent examination did not find alcohol, narcotic or other substances in their blood. The pilots did not transmit distress signals or messages about breakdowns to the ground. In addition, the aircraft was practically new, it began to operate less than a year before the disaster.

The cause of the disaster was called an explosion in the luggage compartment, located in front of the fuselage. The State Security Service of Czechoslovakia, 10 days after the tragedy, presented parts of an alarm clock, which, according to it, was part of an explosive mechanism. The Croatian ultra-right terrorist organization Ustashe was considered a possible organizer of the attack. However, officially the crime remained unsolved, and the names of the perpetrators were not established. official version the causes of the disaster and recognized as a terrorist attack by the Croatian Ustaše nationalists.

A McDonnell Douglas DC-9-32 (JAT Flight 367) exploded at 10,160 meters (33,316 ft). Not only did Vesna Vulović survive the destruction itself, she was also the only survivor of 28 passengers and crew as debris fell to the ground.

22-year-old flight attendant Vesna Vulović was originally not supposed to fly on this flight, but due to an airline error, was assigned to it instead by another flight attendant with the same name (Vesna Nikolic). By the time of the disaster, Vesna had not yet completed her studies and was in the crew as a trainee stewardess. At the time of the explosion, Vesna Vulovich was in passenger cabin, according to some data in the middle part of the fuselage, and according to others - in the tail. The girl lost consciousness, and subsequently could not remember where she was before the start of the disaster. locals were at the scene of the tragedy before the rescuers. In search of survivors, the peasant Bruno Honke discovered Vesna, gave her first aid and handed her over to the arriving doctors.

In the accident, Vesna Vulovich received a fracture of the base of the skull, three vertebrae, both legs and the pelvis. In addition, in the first days after the incident, she was in a coma. According to Vesna herself, the first thing she asked when she regained consciousness was to smoke. And when correspondents asked her if she prayed when she fell, Vesna replied that everyone who prayed in front of her died. And she shouted that there is no God and never was! ..

The treatment took 16 months, of which for 10 months the girl was paralyzed in the lower part of the body (from the waist to the legs).

After her recovery, Vesna Vulovich tried to return to work as a flight attendant for Yugoslav Airlines, but she ended up getting a job at an office job with the airline. According to Vesna, she did not have a fear of flying, because she does not remember the moment of the catastrophe itself.

She married in 1977 (divorced in 1992). Have no children. In 1985, Vesna Vulovich for her " free fall"was listed in the Guinness Book of Records, by the way, Paul McCartney awarded her at the ceremony. It is noteworthy that once it was because of the songs of the Beatles that Spring decided to learn English ...