Trevor Thompson survived Erin Hills air blimp crash. This is the rest of the story

Even now, a year later, memories of the crash come back to Trevor Thompson.

It was the morning of June 15, the opening round of the U.S. Open golf championship at Erin Hills and Thompson was in the sky around a mile east of the course, piloting an airship that advertised a credit union.

Suddenly, the airship was rocked by a catastrophic fabric failure. It began to deflate and then caught fire as it plunged some 500 feet to the ground.

"I remember the smoke inhalation, the heat, wondering how am I going to get out of this thing," Thompson said during a telephone interview from his home in Georgia.

"There was nothing I could do. I did not think I'd survive it. I didn't see any scenario where I would come out of that."

But here he is. 

The sports world moved on. The tournament was played.

And Thompson's life was forever changed in ways few could have expected.

"It was a fantastic experience and I'm better for it," he said. "I'm a better person, a better leader, better business person, better husband."

Thompson is 50.

"I flew airships because I loved it," he said.

At the time of the crash, he flew for different companies. His main job was being a business consultant.

But things have changed.

He is now the president of AirSign Inc., the firm he was flying for on that fateful day in Wisconsin.

He and AirSign Chief Executive Officer Patrick Walsh bonded through the experience.

"Trevor is a phenomenal pilot, a great businessman, a good friend," Walsh said.

Walsh called the crash a "freak accident." Thompson was on his second flight of the day, according to the National Transportation Safety Board Aviation Accident Preliminary Report.

Before takeoff, the airship "was fueled and two of the propane tanks were swapped out with full tanks," the report said. Shortly after takeoff, Thompson, the pilot, "radioed the ground crew that he was returning because the wind was too strong,"

Thompson was experienced and had overcome incidents before, making emergency landings in the New York area in 2015 and the Philadelphia suburbs in 2016.

But those incidents were nothing like what happened near Erin Hills, where fabric envelope panels on the airship tore away. The front section of the envelope "collapsed around the burner and caught fire," the NTSB preliminary report said.

"The accident, when it failed, it was catastrophic," Thompson said. "It was not a slow event. It blew out several panels. I could look up and see the sky. It went very fast."

Thompson said, "If you look at photos, the front burns away and wraps around the gondola. The back acted almost like a parachute, slowing me down. Plus, I was wearing my four-point harness, fully strapped in. One of the last things I remember is tightening everything up."

Thomspon said it took between 23 and 25 seconds to hit the ground.

"It was a very strong jolt, obviously," he said. "When I saw the ground coming up, it was like manna from heaven, the most beautiful grass I had ever seen."

Thompson recalled unbuttoning his harness, coming out of the airship and trying to stand up and attempting to run.

"I fell on my belly," he said. "I started crawling on my elbows. I got maybe 40 feet."

That's when a member of his ground crew, Mike Schmidt, grabbed him by the wrists and dragged him away.

"That's when the explosion hit," he said. "We were close enough to feel it."

Emergency personnel, including an off-duty nurse who was driving by, got to him quickly. He was taken by Flight for Life to Froedtert Hospital.

"I can't say enough about the responders," he said.

Last month, Thompson returned to Wisconsin for final medical appointments related to the crash.

He met with his neurosurgeon, Jamie Baisden, at Froedtert. The crash left Thompson with compressed vertebrae in his lower back, which had to be fused.

He underwent a fifth skin graft under the care of surgeon Nicholas Meyer, director of Columbia-St. Mary's Burn Center. Thompson suffered third-degree burns on his neck, arms, a thigh and 75% of his back.

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And Thompson and his family attended a gala for Kathy's House, a nonprofit hospitality house that provides lodging for patients and their families who travel to Milwaukee for medical care.

Kathy's House provided a place to stay for Thompson's wife, Lorraine, and his mother, Susan, while he recuperated in Milwaukee for a month after the crash.

"I was treated as a neighbor," he said. "Milwaukee is a wonderful city, our home away from home."