Andrew Jones "Day of Disaster" April 4th 1994

After many discussions with my girlfriend, parents and Teammates, plus the fact that the bus was going into Amsterdam that day I decided to come home a day earlier than I had planned. I rang Sschipol Airport to arrange my flight home by credit card. They informed me that my tickets could be picked up at the check-in test at the airport so it was a matter of packing up and leaving my case for the team to bring home.

After breakfast I boarded the bus and we headed for Amsterdam approximately 100 miles away. They had told me to be at the airport by 11.45am to pick up my tickets, my bus dropped me off at 11.50am.
I headed for what I thought was the check in desk, but on arrival was told that I was in the wrong place, I caught an airport bus to the main terminals and found the check in desk. However they then told me that without my credit card I would not be able to purchase my ticket.

I contacted my girlfriend to tell her to drive to my house and pick up my credit card and to produce this card to the check in desk at Cardiff K.L.M. That was at 12.15pm at 1.40pm klm at Amsterdam informed me that she still had not arrived. They informed me that the flight was on time for 2.10pm take off. I pleaded with them to let me board that flight because it was an emergency. One lady told me to see her colleague at the end desk, I explained the situation once again and he faxed Cardiff airport to no avail. He then asked if I had any money on me I pulled out all I had on me which was about £40.00 British money and £25.00 guilders (The flight price was £180).

After minutes of fiddling on the computer, he took all my money and gave me my tickets at 2.01pm. He informed me to go straight to gate c, which was about half a mile away.



Upon arrival a lady at gate c then informed that I was to late too late to board the plane. I explained that it was an emergency and needed to get home. She then contacted someone with a walkie talkie, and immediately took me down some stairs into a waiting mini-bus outside, which took me straight out onto the plane.
I didn't check my ticket, so I just sat down next to a woman at the first empty seat available. The steward then come along, and checked my ticket, he moved me to row 7a as stated on my ticket. We then proceeded for take off.
I was virtually sat on the left wing, which was very noisy, but I got used to it after a few minutes.

As I glared through the window I knew the North Sea was beginning because there were beaches below. A few minutes went by and the signs for the seat belts and smoking went off, with this the steward brought drink trolleys out and started serving drinks, just as he reached the seat in front of me, the captain informed us that 'we had a slight problem with the right hand engine and will be returning to Amsterdam, for someone to check it out' he apologised for any inconvenience caused. Within seconds a ring noise came over the tannoy, the steward immediately stopped everything he was doing and went straight to the cabin where the captain was. He was there for roughly 30 seconds he then returned to serving drinks very quickly throughout the rest of the remaining rows. The smoking and seatbelt signs came back on; it almost felt like we were travelling twice the normal speed. On the return journey to Amsterdam we were dropping very quickly. It was then that the first doubts went through my mind that something was really wrong. At the same time I joked with the elderly man next to me, about being able to fly on one engine. I looked out of my window and could see the ground pylons etc. I thought to myself perhaps it would be easier to jump I then saw the airport and knew the pilot had everything under control.

We got to the runway and were just waiting for the wheels to touch the ground when all of a sudden a screaming noise came from the left hand engine and the nose of the plane came back up, I thought we were going back up again to try again to land, but then I realised we weren't gathering height or speed to lift back in the air.
As I looked out of the windows on the right side, we'd only just missed two cars by inches.
I then at this point knew we were going to crash and thought of my family, girlfriend and my teammates. About 4-5 seconds later an almighty bang hit the plane and we hit the ground. I covered my head with my hands as the seats in front came crashing towards me. "I thought I was going to die" and just as I thought I had everything to live for this was the end of my life. It seemed like ages wee were travelling and crashing through the ground.

We eventually came to a standstill, the right hand side of the plane was a ball of fire, and my left foot was trapped by two seats. In sheer panic I ripped out my foot leaving my trainer behind, I undid my seatbelt, got out of my smashed seat and tried to get out of a window to no avail."I thought to myself thank god I'm alive" but then I panicked at the thought of the plane blowing up. I started climbing over the debris to a gap where the plane had split in half. As I stood on a crushed seat I looked down as someone grabbed my jeans, a woman's head and shoulders were sticking out and she cried for me to help her, as much as I wanted to help everyone, I just panicked myself to get myself out.

I managed to get myself out of the gap of the plane and noticed another boy 'who was an American' got out as well. We both ran from the plane in fear of it exploding. When we got far away, we held each other and thanked god we were still alive, we then watched the rescuers carry off the last of the people who were on the plane for at least 20-30 minutes. A few buses were waiting (re-vamped ambulances) then transferred to a minibus and taken to a first aid centre. I then rang my girlfriend, after treatment I returned to my teammates in Breda, and then travelled back by sea the next day