Survivor of Balloon Fire Is Haunted by Memory

Aug. 27, 2007 — -- Diana Rutledge survived a deadly hot-air balloon accident in Canada Friday, but she is still haunted by memories of jumping from the flaming basket.

"All of a sudden my friend who was with me was screaming, 'Diana, we're on fire, we're on fire!'" Rutledge, 56, told "Good Morning America" from a hospital bed. "It was like my hair was on fire, and in fact, we were on fire."

With 12 passengers and a pilot onboard, the hot air balloon was getting ready to launch at sunset when the basket caught fire near the U.S. border in Surrey, British Columbia, a suburb of Vancouver.

"The pilot ordered everyone out immediately," said John Kageorge of Fantasy Balloon Charters, the company running the balloon flight. "As weight came off the balloon, and the heat of the fire increased, the balloon began to lift off the ground."

Rutledge and others were still in the basket as it began to rise. She said when they were about 50 feet above ground, she made the life-or-death decision to jump.

"I thought, 'Come on Diana, this is do or die. Jump or you are going to die. You are going to go on fire and you are gonna die.' So I jumped, I climbed up on top of the basket and I jumped," she said.

A woman on vacation from Germany was next to her in the basket, and Rutledge helped save her from the flames.

"And as I was jumping, I put my arms under the armpits of the little lady, who is 69 years old, I put my arms under her armpit, pulled her out of the basket and took her down to the ground with me," Rutledge said.

Rutledge said she fell "like a cat" and landed on her feet. Her heels were smashed and every bone in her feet broken.

After flames engulfed the balloon in midair, it came crashing down on an RV park, leaving a tail of thick black smoke in its wake.

"So I laid there and I couldn't stand up, I was too close to the debris. And I was looking in the sky and this balloon was on fire, debris was falling all over. And I was screaming at people, 'Help me, help. I can't walk,'" Rutledge said.

As horrible as it was for Rutledge, it was worse for two women, a mother and daughter onboard, who never got out.

Rutledge said she saw the family's sole survivor, looking up to the sky, saying, "'I can't find my wife and daughter.'

"It just made such a big hole in your heart," she said.

Rutledge knows she is lucky to be alive, but living with this experience is already proving very hard.

"As soon as I fall asleep, I wake up hollering and screaming, trying to get out of the basket," she said. "I can't even sleep, because as soon as I fall asleep, I am trying to get out of the basket. It was, it was horrible."

Panic on the Ground

The flaming wreckage of the balloon ignited three trailers on the ground.

"I couldn't believe it. It was just a split second, it was so intense," said witness Arlene Mullin.

Mullin was outside with her grandchildren preparing to watch the balloon go up, when she noticed the charred balloon hurtling toward her home.

"I saw people falling out of the basket," she said on "Good Morning America Weekend Edition" Sunday. "I saw flames all over the place and debris flying off the basket when we were running. I had the kids by the hand and was just whipping them as quickly as I could out of the way."

Meanwhile, Mullin's husband Dean was unaware of what was occurring outside as he sat inside their home, until he heard her scream and coming running through the house.

"When she started yelling, I looked out the back window, and I could see a bunch of flames coming towards us," Dean Mullin said. "All of a sudden something hit the trailer, bang, and we were out the door, Arlene one way and me the other way. And as I went around the front of the trailer, my truck, something hit the trailer again and my truck. But I was running too fast to take a look backwards."

The day after the accident, officials got an idea of what caused the incident.

Propane burners in the basket, which are used to warm up the air inside the balloon to give it lift, appear to have started the blaze.

And Fantasy Balloon Charters said prior to the incident it hadn't had any accidents in the previous 24 years.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.