It happened about four in the afternoon on August 2, 2005. The Airbus A340 with 297 passengers - including two infants - and 12 crew, touched down on one of the runways and skidded into a nearby creek about 300 metres past the end of the runway, bursting into flames.
The flight crew acted with professionalism and within minutes had evacuated the blazing aircraft. Only 12 passengers sustained injuries.
Canada's minister of transport at the time, Jean Lapierre, called it a "miracle" because all of the passengers survived. And the media chorus that day and in the days following was the same.
However, the "miracle" was partly due to a combination of emergency preparedness at the airport and the skill and professionalism of the flight attendants.
Today, everybody is speaking about the "miracle" in Guyana on Saturday when a Caribbean Airlines plane, landing in bad weather with poor visibility, overshot the runway and crashed into an airport barrier, breaking into two.
But no one is talking about the work of the crew in getting everyone out of the aircraft quickly and safely. They contributed to that "miracle" and deserve thanks for their efforts.
Too often flight attendants are taken for granted. The airline miracles on Saturday, in Toronto six years ago and in the now famous Hudson "landing" in New York, tell us that those flight attendants are also the angels that made the miracles happen.
Jai Parasram | Toronto
Somebody needs to say thanks to them too!
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