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Business Travel

Joe Sharkey's Harrowing Jet Tale

October 3, 2006 at 4:30 PM | 0 Comments

NY Times travel writer Joe Sharkey had an incredibly up close and personal experience with last week's mid-air collision over Brazil, which he detailed today on his blog:

With the window shade drawn, I was relaxing in my leather seat aboard a $25 million corporate jet that was flying 37,000 feet above the vast Amazon rainforest. The 7 of us on board the 13-passenger jet were keeping to ourselves.

Without warning, I felt a terrific jolt and heard a loud bang, followed by an eerie silence, save for the hum of the engines.

Investigators are still trying to sort out what happened, and how — our smaller jet managed to stay aloft while a 737 that is longer, wider and more than three times as heavy, fell from the sky nose first.

Only the wing and tail of Sharkey's Embraer Legacy 600 were damaged. Tragically, 155 people aboard the Boeing 737 that clipped the private jet died in the accident.

Related Stories:
· Colliding With Death at 37,000 Feet, and Living [NY Times]
· Boosters see six-seat 'baby jets' flitting to smaller airports [AJC.com]