Another survivor interview I hadn't seen before:
When his Air Niugini flight crashed into the waters of a lagoon on Weno island in Chuuk state Friday morning, Dr. Victor Wasson said, "The first thing in my mind was, 'Thank God, I'm still alive.'"
His next thought was, "I got to get the hell out of here."
Wasson was seated on the right side of the plane, near the wing when, he believes, the plane struck the end of the runway at Chuuk International Airport.
"We had more than one impact," said Wasson, who described "one big thud" and "then the second one, and then we stopped."
"It's highly likely that the back part of the plane hit the edge of the rocks at the end of the runway," he said.
Seconds before the plane hit the water, Wasson said one of the flight attendants "shouted out, 'Brace for impact!' Before she finished her sentence, we hit the water." He said the plane crashed "about 150 meters from the rocks."
Wasson is a psychiatrist at Pohnpei State Hospital and the national psychiatrist for the government of the Federated States of Micronesia.
Little warning
"I was surprised because there was no mention of like an emergency," he said. "We just suddenly hit the water. We were not informed. ... There was nothing like that."
Wasson said he spoke to the pilot after the crash.
"I asked them, 'Was it an engine problem?'" and he responded, "'No.' He told me it was bad weather."
But Wasson said weather conditions weren't that bad.
"It was a little bit rainy and there was some cloud cover" but "it wasn't like a thunderstorm. ... It was just the usual rain."
"The pilot unfortunately could not see the landing strip," he said. "So he overflew the landing strip and we crashed into the water.
"However, even people who aren't aviation experts would know to circle around if the runway weren't visible, Wasson said.
"Most definitely, human error," he said. "I think the airline needs to make a formal apology."
Panic on board
Passengers were panicking, Wasson said.
"A few of them hit their head, so they were dazed; they were in shock."
Water then began pouring into the plane."Within three minutes it was halfway up my shin, toward my knee," Wasson said, and "it was putting on water quite fast.
"One of the passengers managed to open the emergency exit over the wing; a self-inflating raft deployed, and "all of us just jumped into the raft," he said.
"We had to help the elderly come out," he said. "One needed to be carried out; the guy with the broken pelvis."
Outside the plane, Wasson saw a "big crack" in the fuselage of the plane "right through, just behind the wing ... horizontally, from the top to the bottom of the aircraft."
Local rescue
Dozens of small skiffs manned by local fishermen sped to the scene and helped evacuate passengers as the Boeing 737 slowly sank into 100 feet of water.
A team of U.S. Navy sailors assigned to Underwater Construction Team 2 also happened to be near the crash site and joined the first responders.
"I need to officially thank these people," Wasson said, and suggested that Air Niugini do the same. "The locals here ... actually saved (lives). ... Those without life jackets could have drowned."
Earlier Friday, the Federal Aviation Administration stated the crash had involved Flight 73. The Navy later stated it was Flight 56, the airline's return flight to Chuuk from Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. Flight 73 flies from Chuuk to Port Moresby.
Guam Daily Post