Boys survive crash

last updated 8 January 2015

Great Barrington, Mass.

Three brothers, ages 2, 5, and 10, survived an airplane crash this week when they were protected through a windy night of subzero temperatures by the dead body of their mother. The boys, two other brothers, and their parents were flying home to New Hampshire after visiting grandparents in Florida. The father, Ronald Ferris, 39, reported ice on the wings. He tried to land at a western Massachusetts airfield, but crashed in the snowy Berkshire mountains. Fifteen hours later, rescuers spotted Jordan Ferris, 5, waving in the snow. His father was alive, but would die hours later of a heart attack. The mother, Tayne, and two other children were found dead in the wreckage. Under their bodies, rescuers found Ryan, 2, and Tyler, 10, still alive. “What kept them alive,” a rescue worker said, “was that they were shielded.” A police officer called the survivors “very, very tough” to have made it through the night. “This,” the officer said, “is the stuff movies are made of.”