FLORENCE, Ky, -- The smoke aboard Air Canada flight 797 was so thick that 'by the time the plane landed, you could not see the seat in front of you,' a survivor said Friday.
The smoke engulfed a stewardess as she stood in the aisle giving exit instructions to passengers.
Brenda Mayne of Midland, Ontario, said she survived 'by following a voice' out an exit door over the airplane's wing.
Here is the way Ms. Mayne related what happened when smoke rolled through the passenger compartment of the DC-9, enroute from Dallas to Toronto, just before 23 of the 46 people aboard died in smoke and flames after an emergency landing at the Greater Cincinnati Airport Thursday night:
'We were sitting in row 11 just ahead of the wing,' said Ms. Mayne, one of six Mary Kay cosmetics consultants who had been presented awards in Dallas and were flying back home. Three of the Mary Kay winners died in the plane.
'We had a very good friend who had taken ill in the front of the plane,' noted Ms. Mayne. 'The attendants had moved her to the back to be more comfortable. We don't know what was wrong with her, food poisoning, gallstones, or what, but she could not get from point A to point B.'
As soon as the plane gained altitude after takeoff from Dallas, the sick woman was assigned a back seat so she could recline.
Ms. Mayne said the passengers had finished dinner and were sipping coffee when 'all of a sudden, at this point in time, the woman who had been so ill suddenly went forward without assistance. She was not panicky. She got a flight attendant and must have explained something about smoke in a back restroom.
'The stewardess opened the bathroom door and smoke billowed out. It was extremely black, thick smoke.'
Ms. Mayne said the stewardess then closed the bathroom door and consulted with another flight attendant. Then, all passengers who had been sitting from row 12 on back were moved to the front of the plane.
'Then the air conditioner was turned on and it seemed truly to almost clear,' said Ms. Mayne. 'The smoke seemed to settle. I think it was about five to six minutes later that the crew realized that maybe it was worse, actually, when they saw smoke coming out from around the (bathroom) door.
'The flight attendant made the comment that it was not getting any better and that we would have to land. She pointed out the exits again.
'By the time she finished giving full instructions, you could not see her any more. She was completely engulfed in smoke. By the time the plane landed, you could not see the seat ahead of you. There was no panic on the plane. No one cried. No one yelled. No one screamed.'
Ms. Mayne said she stumbled out of the plane over the wing exit near her seat.
'I could not see anything and I cried out,' she said. 'Someone said to me, 'Follow my voice, keep coming.' And they pulled me out.'
She said she then saw three men and two women exit over the wing. However, she said she saw 'absolutely no flames until I stepped off the plane.'
Ms. Mayne flew back to Canada Friday on a Delta flight. Asked if she was satisfied that the Air Canada crew had done everything it could in Thursday night's ordeal, she said, 'Absolutely. I was sorry to learn I wasn't flying back (Friday) on Air Canada.'
