A schedule swap to be able to see their son’s track meet put Captain Tammie Jo Shults in the pilot seat of Southwest flight 1380 on the day an engine failed, breaking one of the airplane’s windows.
Shults told ABC News' "20/20" that it was like any other normal Friday flight and Dean was on the manifest as the pilot, but Dean took Tammie's flight so she could go to their son's competition.
She said everything was normal during takeoff from New York's La Guardia, but at 32,000 feet, there was a jolt, the Washington Post reported.
"We had a large bang and a rapid decompression. The aircraft yawed and banked to the left, a little over 40 degrees, and we had a very severe vibration from the number one engine that was shaking everything," co-pilot Officer Darren Ellisor told "20/20."
That's when Shults' military training kicked in, she told 20/20.
The cockpit was too loud to talk, so she and Ellisor used hand signals to communicate and land the plane in Philadelphia.
One person died in the ordeal. Jennifer Riordan was partially sucked out of the plane and died due to blunt impact trauma to the head, neck and body. Other passengers had minor injuries, The Washington Post reported.
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