This is the story told in my own words, of the article aired on "Sightings" Dec. 17, 1995 about the NDE of RaNelle Wallace. Quotes were not taken verbatim.
On October 9, 1985 RaNelle Wallace and her husband Terry were on a small vacation, a second honeymooon to try to put back together their rocky marriage. They were in a motel in Utah and planned to take a small plane to another town the next morning. RaNelle was very aprehensive about it as she had had bad dreams the previous night telling her not to go on the plane. She awoke her husband saying, "please just promise me we won't go on that plane tomorrow!" Though later she agreed, the flight was only 15 minutes and they would drive the rest of the way. So that morning they were checking out of the motel, and the receptionist said to RaNelle, "You're not flying are you?" RaNelle told her yes, just a short flight to the next town over the mountains, and the receptionist said, "Well, it's just a strange feeling I have, that you shouldn't fly today. I'll drive you." RaNelle politely refused. Even though it confirmed her intuition, she still got on the plane with her husband Terry, the pilot, thinking she was just having irrational fears.
The sky was clear, winds were calm, and it seemed the perfect day for flying. Ten minutes into the flight though, a storm seemed to come out of nowhere, and suddenly they were in the middle of clouds that stretched all the way to the ground, and they could hardly see anything, until RaNelle yelled that she saw the ground coming up on them. Terry pulled up sharply and they skidded across the face of the mountain, sparks flying from the wings, and soon stopped with the whole plane engulfed in flames. RaNelle was thrown from the plane into the snow but she was completely on fire. She looked in time to see her husband being pulled by some invisible hands out through the flames, almost unscathed except for his burnt hands.
Terry said that what happened to him was he was in the cockpit and he saw this being with translucent white hands come and pull him out, and he said, "Where is the man who pulled me out?" No one was there except his wife burning in the snow. He ran to her and got her out of the flames, but she was burned really severely and in a lot of pain. But together they were able to walk six hours to a highway where he flagged down a truck and got her to the hospital. RaNelle said that while she was walking her skin on her hands was hurting so much that she tore the skins off and threw them on the ground like gloves.
In the hoospital, while the doctors in the emergency room were working on her, RaNelle died--she just let go, and found herself suddenly above the bed, watching the doctors, and realizing that it was her body they were working on, from the one charred hand she could see hanging off to the side of the gurney.
She felt very peaceful then, and found herself surrounded by colors as she felt herself moving feet-first into the colored light. Then she saw her life flash by her in an instant, then darkness came and she was scared. Then she saw a brilliant white light, and as she gazed into it, a love like she had never felt on Earth before pierced through her soul. It was what she had always been searching for, she believed, but had never found in her life. She said she believes it is that kind of love and acceptance that everyone is looking for. She was in awe and wonder of this beautiful light, love, and peace that surrounded and penetrated her entire being right then.
Soon, she saw a beautiful older woman approaching her in the light, with white hair and wearing a white dress, who called out her name, "RaNelle....RaNelle it's Grandma...." RaNelle realized it was her grandmother who had died 2 years previously, and it was at that moment she finally thought, "I'm not dead, am I?" Her grandmother took her hand, saying, "You have to go back, you can't stay here yet." RaNelle refused, saying that she did not want to, it was so peaceful there and loving, she did not want to return to her body. "You must go back," her grandmother implored her, "You have to tell everybody that the key is love." But RaNelle still refused, thinking that she had finally found the love she had been searching for, and no one was going to take that away from her now.
So her grandmother showed her something about her future on Earth. A young man approached her, he was tall and handsome, and came up to her, smiling. She did not recognize him at first but knew his name was Nathaniel, as he began to cry. He said, "Mom, what are you doing here? You have to go back for me, I need you there...." She felt so sorry as she looked in his eyes, and decided then she would put her selfishness aside and go back for his sake. She promised and swore she would give him his chance, no matter what.
"Remember to tell them, the key is love," her grandmother reminded, disappearing into the light.
She resisted going back to the body on the bed which had been clinically dead for a short time, but when she finally did she was engulfed in terrible pain, and it was the beginning of a slow recovery spanning many years for her. She had two children at that time before the accident, and her recovery was aided very much by Terry and the children who stood by her. She and Terry even had matching burn scars on their hands, which Terry said, "fused them together." But RaNelle's face and body had a lot of healing to do as well. Seven years later they had another child, a son--it was Nathaniel. RaNelle remarked that he was the real reason that she lived, all for Nathaniel.
RaNelle agreed to take the "Sightings" interviewer up to the mountain where the plane crash occurred. She was taken off-guard by the emotions that arose for her in returning there. Sitting in the sun on a boulder surrounded by green grass, she started to cry, saying that this was the place where she left her old self behind--it was burried there, on that one fateful day of the plane crash. It was a new beginning for her--a complete re-birth into a new life.
Now she and her husband have given over 100 seminars to people, about the importance of listening to their own inner voice, and about the key being love, living RaNelle's grandmother's lesson. They also spend time as volunteers at hospitals for recovering burn victims, helping them in ways only those who have recovered from such an experience can. They help turn trajedy into miracles, as their lives have been transformed as well.
Lori Tostado (lorazz@crl.com)
More about RaNelle Wallace (ranelle@connectnet.com), you found at her own web-site.
kiwi@spiritweb.org