`Souls' Of Flight 232: A Year After Crash -- The 184 Who Shared A Miracle Try To Escape The Memories

Capt. Alfred Haynes, his doomed jetliner wallowing all over the Iowa sky, responded to an air-traffic controller in the time-honored jargon of his aviation fraternity. There were 296 ``souls on board,'' including his own.

On a sweltering Wednesday afternoon last July 19, they all rode a 168-ton flying brick down into a cornfield at 200 miles an hour. In the flame and dust unleashed when the DC-10 cartwheeled out of control, 112 of the souls on board United Airlines Flight 232 were lost.

But 184 survived. And as they prepare to return to Sioux City for a memorial service Thursday, they struggle with unanswerable questions about life and death, guilt, nightmares, physical injuries that may never heal, strained relationships with people they love, and memories that deny them a single good night's sleep.

They shake at some of life's simplest events, afraid that a highway bridge might fall on them, frightened by the sound and smoky smell of a child's cap gun, convinced that a washing machine has an electrical short that will cause a fire.

Mary Kahl couldn't feel comfortable at work for six months. Paul Olivier, like many other survivors, won't fly on a DC-10. William Robertson drew up a list of things he wants to do in life. Jerry Schemmel quit his job - too many reminders. Rod Vetter fears driving into downtown Chicago. What if a car jumps a guardrail into his lane?

``My life is never going to be the same,'' says Upton Rehnberg, 53.

They question why they lived, when so many others died. They meet in groups to grieve, they call each other at 3 a.m. to sob, they savor a unique joy with the coming of new mornings, the sight of sunsets. Their very survival is a shared miracle.

``On the plane as we were going down, it didn't matter how rich or how poor you were, what color you were or what your religion was, where you came from or where you were going,'' says Garry Priest, 24, of Denver. ``We all drew strength from each other, we were all in it together. As the plane crashed, everybody was special.''

The DC-10 was headed to Chicago from Denver when it attempted an emergency landing at the Sioux Gateway Airport. The jet flipped once and burst into flames. Forty-five minutes before impact, the crew had lost all steering control when the tail engine shattered, spewing out titanium fan blades and chunks of metal that severed hydraulic lines.

Many victims were trapped in the charred fuselage. Some, dazed and burned, walked or crawled to safety. Others, still buckled in seat belts, were found in 4-foot-high corn.

Dozens of survivors will gather Thursday to pay tribute to Haynes' crew and to the rescuers and townsfolk who opened their hearts and their homes to them.

Though each has a unique memory of that terrible day that bonded them for life, they're all amazed they are alive, and wonder why.

Rod Vetter, a 40-year-old former Navy flier who logged more than 300,000 miles with United before the crash, now hesitates before committing to a business trip. Even everyday trips downtown can be a strain.

``I have a fear of things falling and things happening that are out of my control,'' he says.

``I never had the fear driving on the interstate of a bridge collapsing when I was driving underneath it. I have a fear driving into downtown Chicago . . . (wondering) what if a car jumps the guardrail and goes into my lane? Just weird things like that.''

Vetter still thinks of that day frequently.

``There's a lot of things that key in the thought of the crash, whether it's black smoke, loud noise, screeching brakes, the smell of burning plastic,'' says Vetter, who owns an import-export electronics company in the Chicago suburb of Arlington Heights.

``Some people are saying they are not letting it out of their minds. Maybe one year's time is not enough time. Maybe it will take 10 years to get back to a rational view of life. It's not going to heal in a year.''

Kate Wolfe Bressieux hired a handyman to fix her front steps, inspect her washing machine and dryer for electrical shorts, and repair anything else around her house he thought might be a safety problem. By her own description, she ``freaked out'' after a fire in her basement last Christmas.

A 36-year-old organizational-development consultant, Ms. Wolfe Bressieux is unemployed and recently separated from her husband.

Days before any trip, she has nightmares that her car will turn over and burst in flames.

``My life has been in total disarray since the crash. I'm having real difficulty in putting things back together. I'm a very extroverted person, so I'm amazed I've become so isolated and withdrawn.

``When you are sitting next to someone and five minutes later they are dead and you aren't, you wonder why you aren't. Having come that close to my own vulnerability, I don't want to be that vulnerable again.''

Paul Olivier has flown more than 100,000 miles since October, when his broken collarbone, broken right foot, broken right knee, broken ribs, crushed vertebrae and numerous burns had healed enough to allow him to resume running his Palmer Lake, Colo., television-studio design business.

Olivier won't fly on a DC-10, but he has flown to Hong Kong 10 times since November. On the last trip as the plane prepared to land, ``I did everything I could to grab a gulp of air but I just couldn't breathe. That's the worst it has been. I have to force myself to get on a plane.''

Olivier was thrown out of Flight 232 on impact, and though he remembers almost nothing between then and the hospital, the moments before the crash remain hauntingly vivid.

``The girl next to me and I talked about how everything was going to be OK. We planned how we would exit. I told her if the plane filled up with smoke, she should grab onto my belt. . . .''

The girl died.

Mary Kahl doesn't remember the final moments before the crash. But the tragedy turned her life upside down.

``It took me at least six months before I was able to get back to my normal frame of thinking. I found it very difficult handling my job,'' says Mrs. Kahl, a teacher, who with her husband, James, and son, Jimmy, 15, all survived. They live in North Huntingdon, Pa.

Her son refuses to talk about the crash.

``I still think we have some problems looming here,'' she says. She, too, has had trouble discussing it.

``It's hard to go back and think about what happened to all those people. We are the lucky ones. We don't have the physical scars to deal with. There are a lot of people out there with a lot more pain than what we're suffering.''

``Every time I hear about a plane crashing or a plane in trouble landing, even trains bother me . . . it just seems like a feeling of terror that comes over you,'' she says.

Ronald Rohde says every day since last July 19 is a gift.

"By all rights, I should have been dead almost a year ago,'' says the 40-year-old veterinarian from Marysville, Ohio. ``It's easier to find the silver lining in the clouds now. Life's irritations are a little easier to shrug off. What's there to get worked up about when you could be upside down in a burning airplane?

``Every time the sun comes up, I think how lucky I am to be able to see it,'' says Rohde.

Now, when he flies, ``I look at the stewardesses and I look at the pilots and I wonder if it came crunch time if they would perform as well as the captain and flight crew on Flight 232.''

His two children worry, saying: `` `You're not flying on a DC-10? Your plane better not crash.' I say, `They usually don't.' ''

Clifton Marshall, 45, of Ostrander, Ohio, works with Rohde and was with him on Flight 232. In the last moments before the crash, he wrote a goodbye letter to his family. Today he has no angry words, no hostile feelings.

``There are people who think all of the risks should be covered. They're more inclined to think that the world should be risk-free. That ain't the way that it is. . . . I take bigger risks every day riding my bicycle to work,'' says Marshall.

Bruce Benham believes that walking away from Flight 232 was the second of two deliverances he's had in life. The first was his recovery from thyroid cancer in 1985.

Now, after the crash, he's found a new appreciation for life.

``The first time I went skiing last winter, the mountains and the snow seemed more beautiful. There is a certain exhilaration in surviving,'' the 38-year-old Denver restaurant executive says.

``I've become very health and safety conscious because the crash heightened my concern about not being here forever. I've lost 25 pounds in the last six months and I worked at it.''

William Robertson has composed a list of accomplishments and things he still wants to do in life. He already has checked off one item on his wish list: hot-air ballooning.

The 48-year-old Amoco executive from Wheaton, Ill., has set a goal of visiting 20 to 25 foreign countries in the next 10 years and has shifted his priorities.

``I give more time to my family and friends and people I care about. In many cases, I'm more selfish with whom I choose to spend my time.''

Upton Rehnberg's frequent pains in his right hip are a physical reminder.

There are emotional ones, too.

``I was (recently) talking to somebody about the crash, all of a sudden I was crying. . . . It suddenly brought back a lot of the emotions that I felt.''

Rehnberg, who works for Sundstrand Corp., a manufacturer of aircraft components, suffered facial and arm burns when a fireball swept into the plane. He didn't return to his job until December, and hasn't been back on a DC-10.

``I'm working at becoming less of a workaholic. I'm spending a lot more time outdoors.''

Rehnberg, who lives in Rockford, Ill., also is struggling with another personal change - divorce, which, he says, his wife partly attributes to consequences of the crash.

The last year has been one of ``incredible turmoil, both externally and internally. . . . This is just the beginning of a cycle of many, many changes. My life is never going to be the same.''

Jerry Schemmel has stayed in touch with the family of 1-year-old Sabrina Michaelson, the girl he ran back inside the burning plane to save.

Sabrina, of West Chester, Ohio, had been thrown through the air and separated from her mother, father and two brothers. Her cries caught Schemmel's ear as he fled.

``I was tested a little bit, so that has made me feel better. If I'd heard the crying and not gone back into the plane, I would have had terrible guilt feelings. But you'd be surprised how many people would have done what I did,'' says Schemmel, 30, of Denver.

In the past year, Lori Michaelson, 36, has turned from survivor to crusader - lobbying for mandatory infant seats on planes.

``I'm trying just to go on. Instead of going overboard and spoiling your kids, you try not to overcompensate in your life.

``You try to consciously focus on each day and realize how out of control your life is . . . how rapidly things can change. You think you're creating your own destiny in your life and you're not,'' the mother of three says.

Major disasters rehash all the hurt, she says. And even normal child's play can cause problems.

``The oddest things come out,'' she says. A child brought over a cap gun once and her son, Andrew, ``got really upset. He didn't want him to use it. It smelled like a burning airplane.''

And 23-month-old Sabrina?

"She's learned to talk . . . and started walking. She has been running ever since."