She lost her passport and nearly drowned, but an Australian singer who survived the emergency landing in the Hudson River had something else on her mind yesterday.
Emma Cowan, who belts out tunes back in Perth under the stage name “Emma Sophina,” was more interested in the less-than-flattering pose she struck just moments after her rescue.
“Yeah, that’s me with my mouth open,” she joked of a picture that appeared in yesterday’s Post.
“Nice yellow jacket and my mouth wide open. Can you imagine a worse photo to go around the world?”
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Still, Cowan realizes she’s “very blessed to be alive.”
The 26-year-old, who is visiting the United States to further her budding career, recalled how she and other passengers were forced to scramble out of US Airways Flight 1549 on Thursday after it splashed into the freezing waters.
“When we hit the water, [the flight crew] opened the doors, and then everyone just crammed into the aisles,” Cowan told the Sydney Daily Telegraph.
“Everybody was incredibly helpful – just grabbing people and pulling them in front of them.”
Cowan, who was sitting in window Seat 13F, was leaving the city after a sightseeing trip when the Airbus A320 was forced to ditch minutes after takeoff from La Guardia Airport.
PHOTOS: Plane’s Descent Into Hudson River
She said she heard a “startling pop.”
“I thought we’d hit a building,” she recalled. “It was definitely shocking.”
After splashing down, Cowan said she walked onto the wing and took “one large leap” into a big gray raft that inflated near her.
Two flight attendants grabbed Cowan and safely got to shore, she recalled.
That’s when Cowan realized she had no ID with her.
“I almost went back on the plane to get it,” said Cowan, who had left her purse behind under her seat.
“My first thought when I was in the raft was, ‘I’m an Australian citizen with no ID.’ ”
She said it was “the only time she started panicking.”
Once on shore, Cowan, who was uninjured, said she “started to really shiver.”
It took about 10 minutes of “cuddling” with passengers before she was able to raise her body temperature.
She and dozens of other passengers were then taken to the Crowne Plaza Hotel near La Guardia.
“I’m very blessed to be alive,” said Cowan, who is trying to get an emergency passport this weekend from the Australian Consulate in Midtown to return home.
Cowan said she called her parents in Australia and recalled telling her mother: “Mum, I have been in a plane crash, but I’m alive.”
After telling her she had lost her passport, Cowan said her mother replied, “Why didn’t you grab your handbag?”
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