In 1992, Annette Herfkens was living the dream.
She was a successful Wall Street trader with a thriving career, a passionate love life, and the whole world at her feet.
But when she boarded a flight with the man she loved, everything took a sudden, terrifying turn.
Thirty-three years ago, Dutch-born Annette Herfkens was swept away on what was supposed to be the ultimate romantic escape.
Her longtime partner, William — the man she’d loved for 13 years — had convinced her to take a much-needed break from their high-powered lives.
William was the head of the Vietnam branch of Internationale Nederlanden Bank and Annette was a trader. After six long months of working in different countries, they finally carved out time for each other.
This trip was meant to be their reunion — a chance to reconnect and recharge. The plan? Start in bustling Ho Chi Minh City, then head to the dreamy coastal resort of Nha Trang for sun, sand, and serenity.
But along with 23 other passengers on Vietnam Airlines Flight 474, their journey would take a devastating turn,.
A gut feeling before takeoff
As a lifelong claustrophobe, Annette Herfkens felt a wave of dread as she stepped onto the Yakovlev Yak-40 on November 14th, 1992. The old, Soviet-built jet was supposed to carry her and her fiancé to the sunny beaches of Nha Trang.
Her partner, whom she called “Pasje,” tried to soothe her nerves with a white lie: the flight would be just 20 minutes.
But when 40 minutes passed and they were still airborne, panic set in.
“Pasje looked at me with fear. ‘Of course, a shitty little toy plane drops like this!’ I said, reaching for his hand. ‘It’s just an air pocket — don’t worry.’ But he was right to worry. We dropped again. Someone screamed. It went pitch-black. Seconds later, we made impact,” Herfkens recalled to the New York Post.
Waking up in a nightmare
When she regained consciousness, the Vietnamese jungle roared around her.
A stranger’s body was draped over her. Nearby, van der Pas remained strapped in his seat — smiling, motionless. Gone.
“That’s where you have fight or flight,” she said. “I definitely chose flight,” Annette told The Guardian.
Her memories of escaping the wreckage are a blur. “It must have been excruciating pain to get out of there,” she said. “So I must have crawled out of the plane and lifted myself down. And then I must have crawled another 30 yards.”
She was badly injured — a shattered hip, broken leg, collapsed lung, and bone protruding from her jaw. But she was alive. And not alone.
Surrounded by the dead
Because the early hours after the crash, Annette wasn’t the only survivor.
Annette heard groans, cries. A Vietnamese businessman even gave her clothing after her skirt tore. But slowly, one by one, the voices faded into silence.
Soon, she was surrounded only by the dead.
To survive, she used yoga breathing to manage her lung injury — “mindfulness before we all knew the word,” she called it.
She collected rainwater using insulation from the plane’s wings, tearing her elbows so badly they later required skin grafts.
“Every two hours I would take a sip,” she said. “And then—I congratulated myself. And that also makes you survive.”
The world thought she was gone
Back home, families were grieving. Her obituary ran in the paper. Her boss sent a condolence letter. But her colleague and close friend, Jaime Lupa, refused to give up.
“When I promised Annette’s father before I left: ‘I will bring your daughter back alive,’ he became furious,” Lupa said. “‘You are an idiot,’ he exclaimed. ‘Get real!’”
On the seventh day, Herfkens felt herself slipping away. But on the eighth day, a miracle happened.
A Vietnamese policeman and his team arrived — carrying only body bags.
They didn’t expect to find anyone alive.
A new life after tragedy
After being carried down the mountain on a makeshift stretcher, Herfkens returned home. In December, she attended her fiancé’s funeral — arriving in a wheelchair. By New Year’s, she was walking. By February 1993, she was back at her banking job.
But grief lingered. Anger bubbled. Her trauma didn’t disappear.
Years later, she married Jaime Lupa — the friend who had promised to bring her home — and had two children, Joosje and Max. Though the couple later divorced, she forged a new life while holding onto the jungle that nearly killed her.
“If you accept what’s not there, then you see what is there,” she said. “I accepted that I was not with my fiancé on the beach… Once I accepted that, I saw what was there – and it was this beautiful jungle.”
Her mantra became the core of her book Turbulence: A True Story of Survival.
“You learn from taking losses”
Later, Annette also became an inspirational speaker, and she believes it wasn’t just luck that saved her — it was instinct.
“I was the youngest child – I grew up with a lot of love – but I was left alone. I didn’t have parents telling me what I should do and feel. So I developed instincts,” she said.
She even suspects undiagnosed ADHD helped her become “inventive and charming” as a kid. “If I had had Ritalin as a kid, I would never have developed the qualities I had for surviving the jungle,” she added.
When her son Max was diagnosed with autism, she used the same survival mindset: “You have to mourn what’s not there,” she said. “But focus on what is there. With my son, that’s what I did.”
She joined inclusive communities, connected with parents from all backgrounds, and even took Max on “dry runs” to the police station—just in case.
“There were many black autistic boys in our circle, and it was so important to the mothers to teach them that when the police came, they had to keep their hands out of their pockets,” she said.
Still counting the days
Each year, Herfkens marks the eight-day anniversary of the crash. She sips water. She buys herself a gift.
“I like treating myself,” she says with a smile. “I’m good at that.”
Her trauma never fully left. She avoids sitting behind other passengers on planes. Vietnamese food can still trigger flashbacks. But she has never stopped surviving.
Even Hollywood producers couldn’t quite understand her story — wanting to make it more about her.
“I really think that why I survived is because I got over myself,” she said. “You get over your little self, then you get your instinct to work, then you achieve stuff.”
To this day, the jungle—where she lost everything—is her sanctuary.
“It has been my ‘safe place’ ever since,” she explained.
Because for Annette Herfkens, survival isn’t a single moment. It’s a mindset. A way of life. A lesson in loss — and in seeing the light through the leaves.
