Survivors of the One-Two-Go budget airline plane crash in the Thai tourist oasis of Phuket were dependent on their own efforts immediately after the crash, one said Monday.
"We saved ourselves - there was no personnel," Christoph Falchetti told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
He and a friend Marcel Sqinobal were sitting in the 28th row, two seats behind the emergency exit from which they escaped largely unharmed.
He and the others were on the airport runway for a number of minutes without any help from ground personnel.
"There was nobody," he said, explaining that there were fears another plane might land. "It was raining buckets, the wind was so strong and it was really cold - I couldn't take it any more."
Sqinobal received a minor back injury falling into a two-metre deep ditch while fleeing the crash area, while Falchetti slipped as he crossed the damaged wing.
"Physically we have only minor injuries, but psychologically it was hard to bear," Falchetti said from his bed in Bangkok Hospital in Phuket.
"We still see everything, we could hardly sleep the entire night. The images keep coming back, every bit."
He said his impression was that the impact of the crash-landing was so great that it seemed many people were immediately knocked unconscious.
"Everything was full of smoke, and intensely hot," Falchetti said, adding that one of the emergency exits behind him could only be opened a fraction, enabling a few people to get some air before making a dash toward the exit in the centre of the plane.
After enjoying only a week of a three-week holiday, the two only want to return home, but have to wait for new passports.
"We don't have anything any more, apart from a shirt and pants," he said. "One of us still had a wallet in his pocket, so we have at least a little cash." dpa oe mga sc
