Island Life Magazine Ltd December 2013/January 2014 | Page 20

INTERVIEW

Ann Pink with Senior Carer Lisa Nasby

Ann survives to tell of
her three air escapes

A

nn Pink is a remarkable and
indeed incredibly lucky lady.
Born on the Island, and now
living in a Ryde nursing
home, Ann spent 12 years of her life as
an air stewardess.
Perhaps, nothing too remarkable in
that? But known at the time as Elizabeth
Ann Morgan, the charming lady who is
now in her mid-70s, survived no fewer
than THREE serious aircraft emergencies,
including one crash landing, while
working for British European Airways.
In the worst of the three, the plane she
was working in crashed on touchdown
at Heathrow Airport. She was hailed a
‘heroine’ after helping 54 passengers
escape from the blazing cabin. The
accident and her subsequent heroics,
were on the front pages of all the national
newspapers in Britain, and screened on
television. But to this day Ann remains

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modest about the vital role she played.
The crash happened on the evening
of January 7, 1960, when a BEA flight
from Dublin arrived at Heathrow in
dense fog, only for the nose wheel of
the Viscount airliner to collapse on
landing, with the propellers buckling in
a shower of sparks. Soon a fire started,
believed to have been partly ignited
when passengers’ duty-free Irish whiskey
spilled from the overhead lockers.
As flames threatened to engulf the plane,
Ann, along with fellow cabin staff Roy
MacDonald and Mairin Doyle, somehow
evacuate the 54 passengers in less than a
minute – and in those days there was just
one canvas escape chute. Some climbed on
the wing of the aircraft to escape, but the
majority slid down a rope thrown from the
cabin to the ground. The fog was so thick
many of the survivors were lost for a while
trying to find their way to the terminal.

Within minutes the plane, valued at the
time at £400,000, was a fire ball, and all
the passengers’ baggage was destroyed
or badly damaged. Ann managed to
salvage her passport, and still has it, badly
charred by the fire that took hold so soon
after the evacuation.
Ann recalls: “We had flown in from
Dublin, and I remember vividly that
as we crash-landed in the fog we had
to wait for the fire crews to find us.
Some of the air crew managed to get
off the plane, but I stayed on to help
all the passengers get off. Of course the
training I had received helped me, but
I just worked through instinct. I did
not have time to be frightened, but I
do remember thinking it seemed to be
taking an awfully long time. I think the
only injuries were rope burns. I suppose
it was a miracle that everyone got off.”
Ann’s parents, who lived in East Hill