... firefighters train daily for situations like this one, but none of them had experienced it... They knew what to do: One group attacks the fire, another assists injured passengers, and another climbs inside the plane to search for survivors.
Cole, 37, clambered up the slide, which was already slick with foam that other firefighters sprayed on the plane, and he braced himself.
"I was expecting the worst," he said.
So was Benton, 55, who entered after Cole. "I took a little pause. I thought, 'This is going to be terrible.' "
It was black within. Cole, breathing through an oxygen tank, started down the aisle on his knees, groping with gloved hands for anything that felt human. Outside, firefighters aimed foam at the plane, and the spray blasted through the skin of the aircraft, dousing Cole in the face.
An obstacle blocked the aisle, so he started climbing over the seats, running his hands over cushions, patting luggage. What he feared most, he said, was that a child was unconscious under a seat.
Benton followed holding a thermal imager, a device that looks like a camcorder and detects body heat. He pointed it down each row of seats. Nothing.
"I was overjoyed," he said later. "Not a soul was on that plane."
On a Denver runway, a nightmare and a miracle - Los Angeles Times