My near miss

The bombing in London made everyone’s comments on the 2005 Olympics victory rather trivial by comparision.
Media reports included several near miss stories from survivors. My own such story relates to the hijacking on 4 December 1977 of Malaysia Airlines Flight 653 from Penang to Kuala Lumpur, a Boeing 737 aircraft (9M-MBD). The aircraft descended from an altitude of 21,000 feet to a few thousand feet before leveling off and apparently continuing on autopilot. It eventually plunged into a swamp 50 km southwest of Johor Baharu, some hundreds of kilometres beyond Kuala Lumpur. All 93 passengers and 7 crew were killed. Investigations later found that both pilots had been shot.
I left Penang for Kuala Lumpur on the same day. But at the last minute I decided to go by road and rail, so that I could see the sights on the way.