Concorde

Dominic Arkwright meets people who have made life-changing phone calls.

He firstly meets Alice Brooking, who was on the phone to her sister Nathalie in London when an Air France Concorde crashed into her Paris hotel.

It was the 25th July 2000 and Alice was in the Hotelissimo in Gonesse, near Paris Charles de Gaulle airport. A language student working through her holidays as a tour guide, Alice was waiting for a party of young musicians to arrive from England.

Torn between having a nap, having a shower and calling her sister for a chat, she picked up the phone to London.

Half way through the conversation there was loud bang and the phone went dead.

She went to the door of her room, to be met by searing heat and a wall of flame.

"I ran barefoot across the fields, because I'd left my shoes in my room, then tried calling the attention of the car drivers........ If I'd chosen to take a shower or a nap I'd be dead."

Producer: John Byrne

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in February 2011.