Christmas Miracle for Plane Crash Survivor
Francesca Lewis, 12, recounts surviving days in Panama jungle after plane crash.
Feb. 4, 2008 — -- Francesca "Frankie" Lewis, the 12-year-old girl who miraculously survived a plane crash in Panama, spoke today for the first time about the 52 harrowing hours she spent hanging upside down in the plane's wreckage, dreaming of home and calling out the names of her deceased travel companions.
Two days before Christmas, Lewis, her best friend Talia Klein, Talia's father, Michael, and a pilot took off from Panama's Isla Seca resort on a short sightseeing flight.
A brief time later their small plane slammed into the side of Panama's Baru volcano, hit a tree and split into two jagged parts.
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Michael Klein, Talia Klein and the pilot were killed. But against all odds, Lewis survived, though she was trapped upside down in the freezing rain, pinned by heavy suitcases, her face mere inches from the crushed cabin's roof.
"I could see the trees blowing really hard and heard crashing noises. I was afraid a tree would fall on me," Lewis said today on "Good Morning America."
But she also remained hopeful she would be rescued. She continually called out for help and struggled to remain conscious.
"I was screaming Michael and Talia's name to stay awake," she said.
Lewis' mother was in California when she heard the grim news.
"I was Christmas shopping. Everything seemed surreal. The idea of Christmas shopping seemed like the stupidest thing in the world," said Valerie Lewis.
Valerie Lewis flew to Panama, where she met up with Talia Klein's mother to wait for any piece of news.
With darkness falling in Panama, a rescue party could not be launched until dawn, and even then, few held out hope of finding anyone alive.
The search area covered more than 200 square miles of impenetrable jungle, pockmarked with treacherous ravines dropping to raging rivers hundreds of feet below. And the weather was turning ugly.
Nine teams of volunteers set off at first light and spent a grueling day cutting through thick underbrush, but finding nothing.
The next day, Dec. 25, searchers were walking through the jungle for seven hours, when they came upon broken glass from the plane.
