Christie Brinkley reveals how she stays healthy after surviving the helicopter crash

There is no day when Christie Brinkley is not grateful to be alive after a ski adventure almost 31 years ago.

In 1994, the then 40-year model started a heli-skiing tour in the San Juan Mountain Range from Colorado with five other people, reported People Magazine. During the flight, the helicopter took an unexpected sharp turn before scored an abrupt leap.

Brinkley wrote about the almost fatal accident in her new memoir “Uptown Girl”.

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“I think this world is full of magic and miracle,” the 71-year-old told Fox News Digital.

The star noticed that during the flight she was wearing dirt from Chimayo, New Mexico, what healing properties had. The area is known as one of the most visited sacred sites in America and is referred to as “the most important Catholic pilgrimage center in the United States”.

Brinkley wrote that she visited Chimayo two weeks before the crash.

El Santuario de Chimayo in Chimayo, New Mexico. The Roman Catholic chapel, which was built in 1816, is a pilgrimage for Catholics who believe in the healing power of the gloss and the “holy dirt”, draw the pilgrim from a hole in the bottom of the Adobe Church. (Robert Alexander/Getty Images)

“I went to the Santuario de Chimayo north of Sante FE and fell in love with the hope and miracles that came from this tiny sanctuary in the mountains of Sangre de Cristo, where the Pueblo Indians believe that the golden floor inside can protect anyone who touches him,” she wrote in a digital received by Fox messages.

Christie Brinkley said on the day of the crash that she was wearing dirt from Chimayo, New Mexico. (With the kind permission of Christie Brinkley)

Brinkley told Fox News Digital before she got into the helicopter, she had “a bad feeling that day”. She was worried from Chimayo on the helicopter.

“I said: 'Oh magic dirt, do your things, take care of all of us on this helicopter,” she recalled. “I should have said: 'Also, keep the helicopter in the air.' But I believe in miracles.

Many visitors to Chimayo, New Mexico, take a small amount of “holy dirt” in the hope of a miraculous remedy for themselves or a loved one. (Robert Alexander/Archive Fotos/Getty Images)

The helicopter met the side of a mountain, People Magazine reported. Brinkley wrote that the troop was so powerful that the cabin was torn into two parts.

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According to People Magazine, Christie Brinkley traveled with Ricky Taubman, a real estate developer from Los Angeles. Sandra wants Carradine, the founder of the Sheridan Arts Foundation of Telluride; Carradines 11-year-old son Cade; Pilot Tom Sharp; and ski leader Mike Friedman. (With the kind permission of Christie Brinkley)

“The crash was suddenly and traumatic and came out of nowhere,” she wrote. “We had already taken two runs and circle around a third, on the saddle of a distant summit when the helicopter just fell from the sky and fell into a free fall of three hundred feet over his head, without an autorotation.”

“Suddenly it became crystal clear that the only thing that was really important in life and death was the same: love,” wrote Brinkley. “I focused on it [my daughter] Alexa Ray held her in my thoughts and hoped to project my whole heart and my soul to her so that she would feel it at the moment of impact. “

At that time, Christie Brinkley had already shaped himself as Sports Illustrated swimsuit model. (Stan Malinowski/Condé Nast via Getty Images)

“Through all the noise and the disgusting smell of engine fuel and fat, I suddenly found that I was still alive – I hadn't died because of the impact – and repeated Alex Ray's names like a mantra and prayed that I would not feel the helicopter tractors when they were cut through my neck.”

When the helicopter crashed, Christie Brinkley said that she was worried that his blades would hurt her. (With the kind permission of Christie Brinkley)

Brinkley wrote that everyone in the helicopter “In this terrible Tilt-A-Whirl of a helicopter cabin” over the saddle of this mountain over the saddle of this mountain, twisted and rebounded “.

“Everything else around me went in the air,” she wrote. “I tried to grab something – a seat, a railing, everything – everything -, but my whole body felt firmly locked, held back, from a force that I could not see or stop. Overwhelmed, I closed my eyes and waited.

Christie Brinkley started modeling in 1973 when she studied abroad in Paris. (Photo by Ron Galella/Ron Galella collection via Getty Images)

When Brinkley opened her eyes, she was outside the helicopter. She then felt a jerk on the leg – her seat belt had wrapped around her ski boot. Brinkley was still on the wreck and said that she was dragged down a mountain, “towards a transparent granite cliff”.

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Christie Brinkley's daughter with Billy Joel, Alexa Ray Joel, was not with her at the time of the crash. (With the kind permission of Christie Brinkley)

“If the destroyed helicopter fell over this cliff, I would go with it,” she wrote. “So, that is what will kill me? A seat belt strap got tangled around my boot? But then the helicopter only heard foot from the cliff, which was stacked by a white snow wall that stacked mythical, magical and wonderfully.”

Nobody in the group was killed. According to People Magazine, rescue helicopters came within an hour to help. All were brought to the Telluride Medical Center.

While Brinkley went on vacation with Alexa Ray Joel, then 8, in Telluride, the child was not in the helicopter, said the outlet. Brinkley's husband, Billy Joel, was also on tour in Chicago.

At the time of the crash, Christie Brinkley and Billy Joel's marriage were tense. (Sonia Moskowitz/Pictures/Getty Images)

According to Brinkley's book, the press investigators later announced that they were stunned that everyone made it out alive. They called the survival of the group “nothing less than a miracle”.

Christie Brinkley said she was struggling with PTBs after the crash. (With the kind permission of Christie Brinkley)

While Brinkley survived, she later fought with PTBS “out of the shock of the crash”.

“Every time I kept Alexa in my arms, I felt sobbing,” she told Fox News Digital. “I was so grateful that I could continue to be her mother … but there were also some bad decisions … At that time in my life I had the feeling that I let someone else write the script. I had fate taken my pen and write the pages.”

However, Brinkley also examined life through another lens.

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Christie Brinkley's memoire “Uptown Girl” is now available. (Harper influence)

“When I woke up in the morning, I looked out the window and saw a solar power,” she said. “It was the most beautiful solar power I've ever seen. When I looked into the mountains and the sun reached the snow -covered summit, it took my breath away.

The crash also meant the end of Brinkley's marriage to Joel. At that time, the couple were separated due to the drinking of the star. However, Brinkley still hoped that “my prince had finally come to save me.”

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“I waited that Billy said the words I wanted to hear so much: 'I almost lost you, I can't live without you, I love you',” she wrote. “I think Billy must have thought, I sleep when he made a call … but I was very awake when I heard him say the words that I never wanted to hear: 'No, don't worry. I don't go back to her. I just have to see her through that.'”

Christie Brinkley and Billy Joel on their wedding day in 1985. They divorced in 1994. (Patrick Demarchelier/Trunk Archive)

“And so the dream broke apart like debris,” she wrote. “At the time, I knew that our separation was real and that, although I wanted to believe that he couldn't live without me, he was apparently. And I had to learn without living it.”

Brinkley and Joel were divorced in 1994.

The American real estate developer Richard Taubman and Christie Brinkley “trauma” connected “after the crash and married in 1994. They ended a year later. (Gevinnie Zuffante/Getty Images)

In 2021, Brinkley announced on Instagram that she had subjected hip replacement surgery to remedy an injury in connection with the crash. Today Brinkley continues to prioritize her health.

Christie Brinkley wrote in her memoirs that she grew up and had a deep appreciation for Western. (With the kind permission of Christie Brinkley)

“If it is someone's birthday, you have to have a piece of cake because it is no luck not to take a bit,” she told Fox News Digital. “I will only watch my sugar intake for the rest of the day. But I just want to treat my body correctly. It is no longer called a diet. There is nothing to deny.”

“I was a lifelong vegetarian,” she said. “But about a year ago I became vegan and I am thrilled that I did it because I have never felt better. I eat a lot of grains, beans and all possible colorful food.

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Christie Brinkley can be seen on April 28, 2025 in New York City. (Xny/Star Max/GC Images/Getty Images)

“I have a rainbow diet because I will eat a lot of colorful food. It will give me a rainbow of vitamins and minerals to strengthen the body. And they are really what they eat … I treat myself to good nutrition. There is no diet because nothing is steering for me.”