She was ready to meet her Maker.
But at the same time, Jeanette Chaffee was praying hard after realising that the plane she was riding had turned into a crashing coffin with a large hole on its side following a mid-air bomb explosion.
Jeanette recalled the miracle that saved her life and more than 100 other passengers of Trans World Airlines Flight 840 when it crash-landed in Athens, Greece on April 2, 1986, according to Assist News.
She was on the last leg of a trip from Salem, Oregon, to Athens when a bomb hidden in the life vest under seat 10F exploded over Argos, Greece.
She was sitting just 14 feet away from the bomb when it detonated, blasting away the inside ceiling and blowing a 9-foot-by-3-foot hole in the side of the plane just two rows from her.
Five American passengers, including an eight-month-old infant, were instantly sucked out of the hole and fell to their deaths below. Seven others were injured by shrapnel as the cabin suffered a rapid decompression.
"I was jolted awake by an ear-splitting, thunderous boom. It felt like a gun had been shot inches from my head. We were falling out of the sky," Jeanette remembered.
Seeing the clear blue sky through the large hole, Jeanette said she felt something weird. Instead of being scared to death, she felt the "peace of God" that "transcends all understanding" as written in Philippians 4:7.
The reason for this is that she felt "Jesus was sitting with me" and that the "next time I blinked, I would see Him eye-to-eye."
At the same time, she kept praying that the Lord would miraculously save their lives.
God heard her prayer and did not disappoint. The pilot, Captain Richard Petersen, managed to safely crash-land the badly damaged plane—the first time in aviation history when plane passengers survived a mid-air bomb explosion.
The event inspired Jeanette to write the book "Extravagant Graces: 23 Inspiring Stories of Facing Impossible Odds," in which she shares her harrowing experience on TWA Flight 840 and inspires her readers to trust in God during tough times.
