Just shortly after takeoff, an Ethiopian Airlines flight en route to Nairobi, Kenya crashed last Sunday, March 10. Based on a report, the incident happened at 08:44 local time, six minutes after the months-old Boeing 737 Max-8 took off.
Unfortunately, all 149 passengers on board, including eight crew members of the Ethiopian Airlines Flight ET 302 did not survive the crash.
Except for a Greek man who was supposed to board the plane and would have been the 150th passenger. He can also be considered as the only survivor of the Ethiopia crash after being late for his scheduled flight.
According to ABS-CBN News, Antonis Mavropoulos managed to avoid being among the victims of the Ethiopian Airlines crash because he was two minutes late to the boarding gate, missing the flight.
In a Facebook post entitled “My lucky day,” the Greek man uploaded a photo of his ticket and said that he ended up reaching at the departure gate just 2 minutes after it was closed.
At first, he was disappointed because no one helped him and he missed the flight.
“I was mad because nobody helped me to reach the gate on time,” but despite initially being mad, he was now grateful to be alive.
Mavropoulos, who is the president of the International Solid Waste Association, a non-profit organization, was heading to Nairobi to attend the annual assembly of the UN Environment Program.
He also added that he booked a later flight, but was prevented by the airport staff from boarding another plane.
“They led me to the police station of the airport. The officer told me not to protest but to pray to God because I was the only passenger that didn’t board the ET 302 flight that was lost,” he said.
Some of the passengers on the flight were also participants of the annual assembly of the UN Environment Program that Mavropoulos was supposed to attend.