Munson

by Marty Appel

  TR: And what happened?

  JA: Well, things didn’t quite go like my mind had initially thought. The right side of the aircraft was engulfed in flames. I knew that we had popped up, because I felt it, that we popped up onto a ridge. I didn’t realize that we had popped up onto a road. And of course the flames were being created by the fuel. I knew that, as a pilot. But I was feeling pretty good about it, because the right side of the aircraft was not the side of the aircraft we needed to go out. The door was on the left side. And the left side was relatively clear. I didn’t see any smoke or flames there.

  So my job, being closest to the door—I already knew how to open the door—was to turn that handle, and get it open. What I quickly realized is I could not get it open. The door had jammed. At that point, I didn’t know why it had jammed. And David came back, and he gave it a try, and he couldn’t get it open either. And I took a good solid kick at it. And now as I think about it, it was probably ridiculous, but I think I should have been able to kick open that door. But, nonetheless, that main entrance door was jammed. And it was then that we turned our attention back to getting out of the aircraft, because at that point the aircraft has started to fill with smoke.

  And the two things that I remember—and I will hang on this for a long time—is that Thurman mumbled to us. He said, “Are you guys okay?” At this point, he says, “Are you guys okay?” And we said, “Yeah.” I don’t remember whether David said it, or I said it. But one of us said, “How about you?” And he said, “I don’t know. I can’t move. I can’t move.” And he said that somewhat with a gasping breath.

  And it was at that point that, almost instinctively, David and I split up the responsibilities. I was closest to the door. Obviously, I needed to get us out of there. He was closest to Thurman, he was gonna lift Thurman up. We felt that we could probably collectively get him out of there. I know that, because the communication that we had—and this is all in seconds—was, “Let’s go. Let’s get us all out of here.” I cracked the emergency door. And when I cracked the emergency door, flames shot in and above our heads into the cockpit. And again, this cockpit is, you know, only about four feet wide, so it’s not as if there are two or three of us standing there together.

  Um. Thurman was somewhat slumped over. And he did have some blood coming from his nose and forehead. But I, at that point, felt, We are gonna get him outta there. We are just gonna haul him out. I mean, it’s no big deal. There are two of us, there is one of him. And we are gonna drag him right through there. But what I quickly realized was, when the flames came into the cockpit, and started to catch fire in the air, and the black smoke was so overtaking, we couldn’t really breathe. And at that point, we didn’t have a choice. Unspoken word. I pulled the emergency door into the cockpit. And I departed the aircraft. And pretty much dove into the puddle of fuel that was on fire on the right side.

  I know that, as I was departing the aircraft, David gave one last tug on Thurman, and he couldn’t, he couldn’t move him. And neither one of us could move him. And David followed me, right outside that door. And I rolled around on the ground for a moment, and then was unconscious. I don’t really remember anything after that, until waking up in the hospital. The hard part of that of course is that there was a point in time that I knew that I was gonna leave that airplane, and that my friend was not. And that was a terrible feeling.

  TR: And when did you realize that, Jerry?

  JA: I think I realized that when David and I both tried, at the same time, to get Thurman to move. We couldn’t move him. The whole seat was moving. And I have now come to learn, of course, that his seat—because of what we hit on the, underneath the fuselage—that whole seat track had come loose. And I had no idea of course at the time, that that’s what had happened. But that’s why we were not able to lift him and move him. So we just couldn’t get him to where we needed to get him outside that emergency door. And he was unconscious at the time. He was not helpful at all to us, in terms of movement.

  TR: And how long a period of time elapsed, between hitting the ground, and getting the door open?

  JA: You know, it’s funny you ask that question. What was the period of time, from the time that we hit the ground, till that door came open? It, it seemed like a long time. But the truth is, I now know—and I realize, realize then—that we were on fire immediately. I mean, all that fuel. And I don’t know how much fuel we had that day. But probably close to, well, full tanks, and, and, uh, the full, fuel in both tanks. It was now burning. And we were sitting in it. So it was just moments, from the time that that whole right side of the aircraft caught on fire. The time that it took both myself and David to try that, that entrance door, to realize that it was jammed, that we could not get it open. The quick realization that there was only one other way out, and if that door was jammed, we were all going to perish in this. You know, would probably, were just minutes. Minutes.

  TR: That journey, from recognition, that the door would not open, to the option to get the emergency door open. And you mentioned something, Jerry. You mentioned the division of labor, and an unspoken word. How does, how did that happen, Jerry?

  JA: Well, I think, anybody that’s involved in a tragedy, or anybody that’s involved in conflict, and is certainly, every person that’s ever been in the military would know that you react. And when I say “the division of labor,” and “the unspoken word,” I mean that from the standpoint of, where each of us, where each of us were sitting. David was in the copilot seat. He was on the right side of the aircraft. And I was closest to the door. He couldn’t get around me, to try the door. I had to step aside. When I stepped aside for him to try the door, and that entrance door didn’t work, it was natural for him to go back to our other pilot, Thurman, who was there. And it was just unspoken. I had to get the door open. I was closest to it. And the door was beside me. Get the door open, Jerry. This is the unspoken word. Get the door open. We’ll all get out of here.

  TR: At what point, if any? And maybe the better way to ask you, Jerry, is: How much contemplation were you able to, to exercising, in your first recognition, that something has gone wrong with the landing?

  JA: When I first realized that something had gone astray, was really that sinking feeling, and the feeling of acceleration, at the same time. Those senses, that sensation of sinking and acceleration at the same time, it was not something that I was accustomed to as a pilot. Pilots don’t like things they never experienced before. [Laughter.] So when we made contact with the ground. You know, you have to remember, Tom. The throttles were full forward.

  TR: Well, would you, would you? But the point I want to get you to, which is, Thurman’s reaction. His reaction. I realize where you were sitting, Jerry. And yet you admit, you were craning over, to look into the cockpit. But how did Thurman react to that sinking sensation?

  JA: Well, Thurman reacted, I think, well. And he did what needed to be done. He immediately went to those throttles. I saw the little frown on his face. My interpretation of that frown was, This isn’t quite right. I don’t like it. We are gonna go around. Throttles all the way forward. We are gonna go around one more time, and try this again. Again, a natural reaction for a pilot. After he pushed the throttles forward, and then we felt that acceleration, and yet still felt the sinking, is when I realized that the impact with the ground was gonna be made.

  TR: And what, if anything, happened in the cockpit, when, in your mind, a crash was inevitable?

  JA: Well, once we realized that a crash was inevitable, I am sure the other two pilots, Thurman and David, probably realized at the same time I did, you had a second to prepare yourself. A second to prepare yourself for impact. Irony is a strange thing, Tom. And we went through a clump of trees, four or five inches in diameter as I later learned. And those trees slowed us down. Remember, the throttles were pulled forward. Those trees slowed us down. And we skidded along those trees, eventually to the point where we crashed back to the ground, and we hit a stump. Now, while we were crashing t
hrough those trees, those were the bumps that I heard. I now know that. Those were all those bumps. [Claps.] That was [claps] as we bumped along. [Claps.] That slowed the airplane down enough, for us to, two of the three of us, to survive. Um. Thurman was doing everything possible, as a pilot, to put that aircraft on the ground safely. He did what he was trained to do. He had full throttles. He was trying to accelerate and get the airplane climbing again. That day, it was not to be, though. It was simply not to be.

  TR: When you look back at the day and what happened, Jerry, what is the significance, in ultimately what happened, of the stump?

  JA: Well, the stump. The stump is—it’s now gone. About a four-by-five-foot area. A large tree that had been cut down. That stump hit our aircraft. No. Our aircraft hit that stump, right on the pilot side. I know now, that’s why the door wouldn’t open. I know now, that’s why Thurman’s seat had come loose. Because that stump, when the aircraft went over the stump, completely ripped off the bottom of the aircraft, on the left-hand side. At that side. You know, Tom, the irony of the stump is, we hit the stump with the left side of the aircraft. And that’s what tore the seat loose from Thurman. That’s the reason Thurman couldn’t move, is because of that stump. The reason we couldn’t get the door open on the left side was because of that stump. And ironically enough, the left side of the aircraft was the clear side, when we, initially when we finally stopped moving. But that was the side we couldn’t get out. And had that stump hit on the right side of the aircraft, I suspect David would have probably had the same outcome as Thurman. And I suspect Thurman and I would have gone out the entrance door. Fate is something one can’t explain.

  TR: But Jerry, as you ponder fate, how do you make sense of it, or reconcile it?

  JA: You know, that’s very difficult. And you don’t, you don’t know for sure what the future holds. But we were in the air that day, thirty minutes. Thirty minutes. It changed Thurman’s family. He didn’t see his three children grow. And his wife became a widow. And a lot of Yankee fans lost their captain. And, yeah, baseball lost a good player. But a lot of us lost a lot that day. And I lost a friend. I remember finally reading all the news articles and thinking that the whole country was somewhat mourning the loss of this ballplayer. And I had, up until that point, even though I had laid in the hospital for a couple of weeks of burns that I was recovering. I hadn’t thought about Thurman as the New York Yankees’ captain. I found him as my friend. And I didn’t realize how many people were being affected. I certainly knew that Diana and the children would be affected. I knew that my life would be different. Sometimes twists and turns that take place. I knew my life was gonna be different now, because I wasn’t on the same track, businesswise, as I was before, with Thurman. But now that I look back on it, twenty-five years later, so many people have had their lives affected by that.

  TR: But just you, Jerry. And go back to something that you, you summed up in a sentence. What did you lose that day?

  JA: Well, what I lost that day was a friend. And I lost somebody that stimulated me. And I lost someone that I lived vicariously through. And Thurman and I used to joke with each other that I live vicariously through him in baseball, and he lived vicariously through me in commercial real estate. And we said many times, “What would really shake ’em up, Jerry, if you showed up at Yankee Stadium, and I showed up out selling real estate.” And I said, “Well, I have. I think, Thurman, you would be a lot better in real estate than I would be playing baseball.” [Laughter.] So I did lose that. But I think what I also lost was a future that was going to be interesting. And Thurman was a very interesting guy. And Thurman was a guy who was so much more than a baseball player. And I lost the opportunity to really see him grow.

  TR: How did you cope, in the immediate aftermath of the accident, Jerry?

  JA: Well, any time you are involved in an accident, and you survive, versus others, guilt is natural. And Dave Hall and I haven’t communicated in years. Not that we don’t want to. It’s that the only memories we have are painful ones. And you go through the feeling initially that you should have been able to get him out of there. Then reality sets in. You talk to the county coroner, and the county coroner gives you the report. And you talk to folks that witnessed the aircraft afterward, and you realize that you were very fortunate to get out, let alone get someone else out. And you read all the official reports, and you realize that there wasn’t a whole lot that you could have done that day, to change the events.

  TR: So why did you [feel guilt]?

  JA: The—the guilt comes and goes. And the natural feeling is to be feeling guilty that you were not able to, as a pilot, maybe change that last approach. As a pilot, not to be able to recognize something. Gosh. Are the flaps down? Is there a gear down? Are we established? So you have the guilt, as a pilot, for not recognizing what needed to be done on the flight. But you also then, of course, have the guilt as a survivor. And the guilt is not something that is … overwhelming. I thank the Lord every day that I am around an airplane, that I survived. I still fly, Tom. I, I am a pilot today. I own an airplane. I have much more respect for aviation. And so yes, there is guilt. But I can’t ever feel guilty, I suppose, for not trying. And we did try. And we stayed in that airplane, both David and I stayed in that airplane, until we possibly realized, until we finally realized, that if we stayed any longer, we both would perish.

  TR: Yet you still maintain … guilt over not getting him out. Why?

  JA: Well, it’s a natural reaction, to be able to. It’s a natural reaction, to want to be able to do more than what you did. As a reporter, you know, you have the opportunity sometimes to look at a film and say, “Gosh, I wish. If I had that to do over, I’d do it a different way.” But aviation accidents, you don’t get to do over. There are no do-overs. There are no mulligans. And we, in an aviation accident, when you crash—aviation is much less forgiving than some other situations.

  TR: What did you learn when the coroner’s report came back, Jerry?

  JA: One of the things that I learned when the coroner’s report came out, that probably has helped me over the years, is that, um, at the time David and I left the aircraft, that there might not have been a whole lot we could do to save Thurman at that point. That he had spinal damage. That his neck had been broken. And that when we left that aircraft, we had probably done everything that we could have. And when I met with Diana, after the accident, it was so hard to look her in the eye, and say, “You know, Diana, we did what we could, to get Thurman out of there. And we just couldn’t do it.” And that was tough then. That was really tough. [Cries, coughs.] That was probably the hardest part of it all. Sorry about that.

  TR: The report. You mentioned how often your mind goes back to the report, in a sense, as a comfort.

  JA: Yeah. The National Transportation Safety Board report, which details the accident almost in the third person, which then gives me the ability to read it in the third person, offers me a lot of comfort sometimes, in recognition of what we did, was the right thing. And as difficult as it is to accept the loss of Thurman at a very early age, two of the three people in that accident that day survived. And that’s a blessing, because three people could have perished. Certainly one perishing was bad enough. But it could have been a lot worse. And when you read that NTSB report, what you realize is that Thurman was a well-trained, competent pilot, who made a mistake, a couple of pilot errors that day. And pilots are human. And when pilots make errors, aviation is not very forgiving. So we have to be very careful, in that regard.

  TR: You mentioned, just before we broke, Jerry, that Thurman made a mistake or two. What mistakes did he make?

  JA: Well, in the last, the last time around, as we now all realize from all the reports, we probably should have put the flaps down. And as we got into our sinking and acceleration, the gear had not yet been put down. So probably the two mistakes that were made on the last time around, is that we didn’t have our approach flaps in position, and that the gear was put down late. The ge
ar was put down. It was just put down a little bit later than normal.

  TR: What’s the biggest misconception, all these years later, about what happened?

  JA: The misconception, in my opinion, is, is that you hear a lot of people talking about Thurman as a pilot. I have heard other baseball players—I have had contact with pro ballplayers over the years. And I hear them giving their opinion of Thurman as a pilot. And I think to myself, “Well, they are not a pilot. What qualifies them to judge Thurman’s skills? And have judged his skills twenty-five years ago?” So the misconception, I think, that a lot of people have is that Thurman was not a good pilot, that he was “rushed through his training much faster than he should have been.” There is no question that his training was accelerated. No question about it. He did it in a very short period of time, what takes many pilots years to do. In a year and a half, he went from flying a single-engine aircraft to a jet. However, he did it within the regulations.

  TR: And when we were talking earlier, Jerry, you mentioned something with a lot of flair. That’s Thurman’s approach to life. And you, you made a bit of a baseball analogy. He lived. “He did most things as if it were a full count and two out,” etc. If you wouldn’t mind, reprise that, and elaborate on what you meant, and why you believe in that.

  JA: Thurman was a very intense, focused individual. And he lived life with the throttle to the fire wall. With the pedal to the metal. And he was a “get it done, come through”–type guy. You know, 3-2 count, bases loaded, bottom of the ninth, you wanted him at the plate. Handball is a game that’s played, first one to 21 wins. I can remember matches [tied at] 20-20 with him. And if we would have 20 points, I knew we’d get 21. He could always punch the ball over the goal line. That’s how he was. The intensity that he had, the focus that he had. He just couldn’t be stopped. When he learned to fly, he was also that intense. He would study the manuals of the airplanes that he was learning to fly. He would know the page. Not just the information, he would know the page number where the information resided.