16-year-old girl uses survival skills to walk away from mountainside plane crash

If you don’t ever watch survivalist shows on television, perhaps the story of 16-year-old Autumn Veatch will inspire you to start.

On Saturday, July 11, Veatch, along with her step grandparents Leland and Sharon Bowman took off in their small plane from Kalispell, Montana, but never reached their Washington destination. Like any teen, Autumn posted an Instagram photo of herself. The crash most likely happened just minutes later.

Authorities soon started searching for the wreckage, but the terrain is steep and treacherous, and weather conditions cloudy.

Local sheriffs say the plane came out of a heavy cloud cover on Saturday, straight into a mountain. Veatch survived the fiery crash, only to realize she was alone, in an isolated location, and she was going to have to go for help by herself. Covered in bruises and burns, she walked for an undetermined number of miles to a trailhead, eventually flagging down a passing motorist, who drove her 30 miles to the Mazama Store in the rugged Cascade Mountains, where she had a harrowing call with 911.

Her father said Autumn is in good spirits, joking about the survivalist shows they’d watched together. She used her acquired survival skills over two days of walking through the woods, even sleeping on a sandbar for safety. According to her Facebook page, Autumn works in wildlife rescue.

Washington residents might remember another brave young resident from 20 years ago, Heather Boswell, who fought off a shark that had bit off her leg during a NOAA expedition off the coast of Easter Island in 1994. Like Autumn Veatch, Boswell’s spirits (and adrenaline) carried her through her initial hospital stay; she even laughed when her sister cheekily gifted her a stuffed purple shark.