A Joliet, Illinois, woman who was on her first helicopter flight helped land the helicopter when the pilot blacked out–and helped saved the lives of her fiance and the pilot.
Adam Barnett and Carli McConaughy were in Hawaii on vacation. The two got engaged then on the last full day of their vacation, they were taking a helicopter tour of the island of Oahu when their pilot suddenly stopped talking and slumped over.
Her fiancé was screaming in the back to “pull up,” and the helicopter was 1,000 feet above the ocean, and McConaughy did just that. She grabbed the controls and slowed their free fall just enough to save their lives.
The chopper crashed, but it was in shallow water on a sand bar.
The fiance, Barnett, swam out of the debris and lifted the wreckage off the sand bar as the water rose around them. They worked together to pull the pilot out.
The pilot survived.
