Freefall

On July 23rd 1983, Captain Pearson entered the cockpit of a twin-engined Boeing 767. The pilot checked his systems and keyed into the computers the information he received from the ground crew, double-checking the fuel. After a routine take-off and stopover the flight proceeded normally on the final stage of its route. Suddenly at 41,000 feet one of the engines failed and seconds later the other engine did the same. As the plane was forced to glide for 45 miles the crew discovered that without fuel the computers would not work. Without the computers they also could not know their speed, altitude, they could not lower their landing gear, or send out the signal that allows air traffic controllers to pick them up on their radar screens.;This book provides a reconstruction of events as a simple mathematical error almost led to a massacre. The book provides the reader with an idea of how all the parties involved in this event felt at the various stages. The reader is given the opportunity of experiencing the near-catastrophe through the eyes of the pilot and passengers, the air-crew and ground crew, the air traffic controllers and the ground witnesses.