In 1985, Delta 191 crashed. It killed 137 passengers in total. Richard Laver was on the plane and lived to tell the tale. Now, he’s reflecting on his tale of survival.
He was just a boy when the plane crash, traveling with his father Ian Laver. Sadly, the tennis coach was one of the ones killed in the crash. Writing in People, Laver reflected on the doomed plane. He wrote, “I’m one of the few people in history that has ever been thrown from an exploding jumbo plane and lived. The Federal Aviation Administration called my survival impossible.”
Laver had been 12 years old. He was a junior tennis player, on his way to compete in a San Diego tournament. In the days leading up to the trip, Laver said he kept dreaming of a plane crashing. His mother assured him that he would be alright.
Richard Laver Knew Something Bad Was Coming
He wrote, “We were the last people to get on the plane that day. As we flew over Dallas, about halfway into the trip, I looked over to my right and saw a storm cell out the window, dark and foreboding. My father didn’t seem to be concerned: He was drinking a rum and coke and smoking a cigarette, laughing as he watched a cowboy film.”
Laver suddenly felt a sense of foreboding. He realized that the plane was going to crash even before it did. He wrote, “My internal voice said, ‘Don’t put your seatbelt on.’ I listened. And I put a blanket on my lap so the flight attendants wouldn’t see.”
For whatever reason, Laver’s instincts proved to be correct. The aircraft did crash, and he also somehow lived thanks to not putting the seatbelt on. He wrote, “What happened next made headlines around the country: The plane hit a wind shear as part of a microburst in the storm. It felt like an elevator dropping from the hundredth floor to the first. Mayhem erupted on the plane, and everyone was screaming. The plane never quite made it to the runway, instead hitting several water towers before being consumed by an explosion like a mushroom cloud. “
Laver was the only survivor from the aisle. In fact, most of the people on the plane ended up dying as a result of the crash. Laver was slung from the aircraft at a blistering speed.
He Was Ejected From The Plane
He wrote, “But I flew out through the explosion and landed in a nearby field, whipped by 70 mph winds. Golf-ball sized hail was hitting me. My face had been burned. I couldn’t move or speak. I couldn’t yell for help — I later learned that I was ejected from the plane at almost 300 mph — 50 yards through the air.”
As he lay there, Laver thought he would also drown. However, someone drove by and stopped and rescued him from the water. He went to the emergency room, via helicopter.
He wrote, “I was helicoptered to Parkland Memorial’s burn unit, and if there was ever a God, it was needed in those halls because it was screaming after screaming from the other crash survivors, so many of whom were heavily burned.”
After the crash, Laver dealt with survivor’s guilt and also trauma for years. However, over time, he learned to heal and started a family of his own. He wrote, “When tragedy strikes, your life is not over. It’s just getting started. There’s a purpose for all of these things. You just have to dig deep to get there.”