‘I focused on seeing my children again’

A SURVIVOR of the Cork Airport crash has revealed how thinking of his wife and children helped him through the horrendous moments after impact.

Still bearing the scars of last Thursday’s accident, Mark Dickens, 40, a father of two girls aged eight and five, and a two-year-old boy, spoke for the first time yesterday about how he survived the Manx2 crash in dense fog, which claimed the lives of six people.

“I focused on my children and on seeing them again,” he said.

Speaking from his hospital bed at Cork University Hospital, with his wife Tara at his side, Mr Dickens, paid tribute to members of the airport’s fire crews and to the medical staff who have been caring for him for the last week.

“The care has been fantastic — from the moment I was cut free from the aircraft, from the emergency shelter at the airport, and here at the hospital,” he said.

“I can’t say enough about the nursing and medical team here.”

He also revealed how one of the nurses even gave up her day off to take his wife, Tara, shopping.

Mr Dickens, a regional security manager for a international retail chain, and who lives in Watford, England, is a regular user of the Belfast to Cork flight.

He was sitting near one of the wings on flight NM7001 last Thursday.

He has landed at a fog-bound Cork Airport before and was not overly concerned when pilot, Jodi Lopez, aborted the first and the second landing.

He said the pilot told the 10 passengers that visibility was poor but Mr Dickens said the fog was so thick, he thought it was cloud.

He couldn’t see the ground on the third and fatal landing approach and said while he wasn’t that concerned, other passengers were nervous.

“We thought the third time would be OK,” he said.

“We came in, with no great issues, and I was waiting to land.

“As we came through the fog, or cloud as I thought, I saw the runway. We were quite close to it, too close, I thought.

“The next thing I recall, is that we banked, the wing hit the runway and we flipped over.”

He said there was lots of screaming and shouting.

“The next thing I remember was that the plane was at a rest. I was upside down, trapped under seats and people, wedged in.

“Once I came to rest, and I knew I couldn’t move, I started to feel pain in my chest.

“I was having trouble breathing, so I tried to stay calm, and focus on keeping my breathing regulated.

He had suffered seven broken ribs, a broken collar bone and shoulder blade, a punctured lung, and a torn nerve in his right arm.

“I just focused on my children and on seeing them again,” he said.

In an interview with RTÉ, he said strange thoughts began to run through his mind — he lost his iPod, and he worried about contacting the person who was waiting for him at the airport.

He then smelled smoke and aviation fuel and was concerned the plane might catch fire. But the emergency crews were on the scene within seconds, shouting: “we’re here, we’re here, stay calm”. He described the fire fighter who pulled him from the wreckage as a “hero”.

He didn’t find out until later that people had died.

“I did ask did everyone make it out but I think I was protected from that. My thoughts are with those families of those people who didn’t make it out,” he said.

It was Monday before he could look at the press coverage of the crash.

“It’s amazing that anyone got out,” he said.

Doctors are monitoring his progress and he is hopeful of being allowed travel home within a few days.

“I’ve got three children who are with their grandparents, who want to see mummy and daddy and we want to see them,” he said.

“It’s very tragic for those who lost their lives, but life must go on. I won’t have a problem flying again, but I suppose I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.”

He declined to discuss details about his decision to hire a London-based law firm which is taking legal action on his behalf against Manx2.