'The question everyday is why?' Seaworld crash survivors' guilt

For Elmarie and Riaan Steenberg and Marle and Edward Swart, somehow they've lived to tell the tale of surviving a mid-air helicopter collision.

It's an extraordinary story of defying the odds, escaping the mangled wreckage of their aircraft after it made a miraculous emergency landing on a sandbank on the Gold Coast.

But any elation they had when they touched down was quickly tempered by looking 50 metres in front of them, and seeing the other helicopter which had crashed back down to the ground.

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In an instant, first responders were performing CPR on several of the passengers pulled from the wreckage, and it was abundantly clear that people had not survived.

"It's the hardest part and it's very real. The question everyday is: why?" Marle Swart told me.

"Why did we survive? We're just ordinary, boring people. Why us, you know? We're nothing special.

"So yeah, you think about that every day."

Four people were killed on the other helicopter: pilot Ash Jenkinson, along with three of his passengers; British tourists Diane and Ronald Hughes, and Sydney mum Vanessa Tadros.

The Swarts and Steenbergs spent several days in Robina Hospital after the crash, with Marle and Elmarie undergoing surgery to remove literally thousands of pieces of glass and carbon fibre that lodged in their bodies.

On the day I met the couples, weeks after the crash, Elmarie showed me a piece of glass a nurse had pulled from her leg the night before.

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It was a confronting reminder of the long road to recovery ahead.

Yet the mental scars will no doubt take even longer to heal.