SAN DIEGO -- A 77-year-old Mira Mesa man riding in a truck that plunged more than 500 feet down a Point Loma cliff talked to 10News about the moments that led up to the crash and what was going through his mind after the incident.

John Little is at the University of California, San Diego Medical Center, where he's recovering from Monday's truck crash down a cliff near Cabrillo National Monument at Point Loma. Little suffered a broken knuckle and contusions to the head and chest, and he was scheduled to be released soon.

The driver of the Chevy S-10 pickup truck, 91-year-old Harold Reed of Clairemont, is in another room in intensive care. Reed remains in critical condition with head and back injuries.

Little told 10News' Steve Fiorina that he and Reed had gone to Cabrillo National Monument to take photographs when Reed hit the accelerator instead of the brake while parking. That sent the truck over a curb and down the cliff. The two were quickly rescued and rushed to the hospital for treatment.

Little said, "That was a lifetime out there. If either of us didn't have seat belts, it would've killed us."

He said they were "holding on for dear life. I hollered at him, asked him if he could stop the thing. Naturally, he couldn't do it. I heard him stomping on the brake, trying to stop it. Once it got in that grass, sliding, it started picking up speed."

The pick-up rolled over several times and landed on its roof. Reed was trapped and unconscious while Little was able to crawl out through a hole in the windshield. As they were being rescued, Little said, "I was just praying he wasn't going to die."

Little summed up the outcome: "It turned out the way it was supposed to. We got hurt, I got hurt a little, he got hurt, but we're going to walk away from it. The good Lord's going to see to it we walk away."