The sole survivor of the crash was Cecelia Cichan, a four-year-old girl from Tempe, Arizona, who was returning home alongside her mother, Paula, father, Michael, and a six-year-old brother, David, after visiting relatives in Pennsylvania. Romulus firemen found Cichan still belted in her seat, which was faced down.

The most famous story of a four-year-old girl surviving a major aviation disaster is that of Cecelia Cichan, the sole survivor of Northwest Airlines Flight 255. On August 16, 1987, the McDonnell Douglas MD-82 crashed shortly after takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport due to the pilots' failure to set the flaps and slats properly. Of the 155 people on board, Cecelia was the only one to be found alive amidst the wreckage, still buckled into her seat. Her survival was widely hailed as a miracle, as her mother, father, and brother all perished in the accident. Cecelia was raised by her aunt and uncle in Alabama away from the media spotlight to protect her privacy. It wasn't until 2011 that she spoke publicly for the first time in the documentary Sole Survivor, where she shared her perspective on living as the only person to walk away from such a catastrophic event. Her story remains a poignant chapter in aviation history, often cited in discussions about the incredible resilience of children and the random nature of survival in high-impact accidents.