LANSA Flight 508

Do you know the story of Juliane Keopcke and how she survived the crash of Lansa flight 508 in the jungle and to this day she lives to tell the tale? Well, this is the story of Juliane Keopcke and how she survived the crash of Lansa flight 508. 

It was December 23rd of 1971, and Juliane had just graduated from college. She was 17 years old, so her mom said that they will be going to live with their dad who was a researcher in the Amazon RainForest station. Since they were in Lima, they needed to go to Pucallpa which was the closest city to the Research station. So basically their only option was to go by plane but since it was the holiday season all the flights were fully booked except one Airline LANSA that was a dangerous one because it had many crashes. Since it was their only option they booked the last remaining two tickets on Flight 508.

December 24th, 1971, the day of the flight Juliane and her mom headed to the Lima international airport and got their boarding passes. Then they had to wait for 7 hrs because the plane that they were supposed to be on was delayed due to bad weather. The flight's final destination was Iquitos Peru, but it needed to stop over in Pucallpa to refuel and deboard passengers. Finally, the flight took off on the afternoon of the 24th. It was still bad weather in Lima, but Lansa wanted the plane to take off because it had already been delayed for 7 hrs not knowing what price they would have to pay for this mistake.

 At first, everything was normal but then 23 minutes later the plane entered severe turbulence and a bolt of lightning struck the plane and it exploded. Juliane's seat was ripped from the plane and she was falling from the plane still strapped to her seat. She finally landed in the forest unconscious but she was alive.

After she woke up she started to try to find her mother but she didn't find her. She then decided that she would  try to find help. She used techniques that her dad had taught her. First she went to find food and found a pack of candies lying in bushes but she found nothing else related to food in the wreckage. Then she followed the river hoping to find a settlement or a village. She stayed in the jungle for 10 days eating only the candies, some edible things in the forest and drinking the river- water.  When she finally found a hut and inside the hut she lay down and saw a big bottle of gasoline. She looked at her wound which was infected with maggots. Then she remembered what her dad had taught her. She took the gasoline bottle and poured it on the infected cut. While some of the maggots fell out, others dug deeper into her wound.

Since she was very exhausted, she rested. The next day two men found her in the hut and took her in the boat to the nearest city possible which was Pucallpa and was treated there. Then the next day her dad came to see her in the hospital. After recovering, Juliane and her dad as well as a team of rescuers went to the scene of the crash.  Since Juliane had survived she knew the route to the crash and after getting there it was clear that only she had survived the crash. It is said that 14 people, including Juliane’s mother, survived the crash but later died. While waiting for rescue the plane was a Lockheed L-188A Electra and there were a total of 92 people.

An investigation was summoned about why the plane crashed and revealed that LANSA was to blame because here's the short view about why the airline was to blame.  LANSA had already two crashes before the flight and the flight had been delayed for 

7 hrs and it cost money. Moreover, Lansa wanted a good reputation and this was not helping. So LANSA cleared the plane for take off even though there was bad weather in Pucallpa. They thought it was fine and the plane could handle a bit of turbulence but what they didn't know was that it was not a normal storm, it was a thunderstorm!

the plane

juliane currently