You wanna know a little pilot secret?

It's not like I have a bomb in here.

[dramatic music]

Whew!

Hi, my name is Fatima Shafi.

[bell dings]

[Narrator] Fatima is a captain

for a major U.S. commercial airline.

She's also a former avionics engineering officer

for the Pakistani Air Force.

Today I'll be breaking down clips

from movies and t.v. about flying.

Overweight take off, American Made.

No mas, no mas.

No mas.

But there's plenty of room gringo.

[man speaking in a foreign language]

Guys, guys.

It ain't about room, all right.

It's about weight.

Just because there's empty room

that you can see in the aircraft,

does not mean you can fill it up all the way to the brim.

No mas.

An aircraft, every time before it flies

is required to be checked for performance

and weight and balance.

You calculate a center of gravity

for that particular flight

and you calculate how much weight you can carry

in what parts of the aircraft.

The aircraft has to be within a certain operating on flow

for it to conduct the entire flight safely.

Whoa, whoa, where the hell you think

you're goin' big fella.

Either, I fly the big fella, or I fly your product.

Tom Cruise was correct in kicking the guy out.

He was probably also flying the aircraft further away,

so he's carrying as much fuel as he can,

maybe even more to conduct a long flight.

[plane engine revs] [men chatter]

[plane engine revs]

The depiction of an overweight take-off their doing

is pretty much on point.

[plane engine revs] [stall warning horn beeps]

He tries to lift off and the stall warning horn goes off.

That stall warning horn is an indication

that a stall is about to occur.

[stall warning horn beeps] He does not rush the take-off,

which is exactly what he should have done.

When a stall occurs there's just not enough air flow,

and the wing basically quits flying.

[stall warning horn beeps] [plane engine revs]

He wants to get rid of the drag of the aircraft,

so he lifts the landing gear up.

Up until that point, I was with it.

But then, he's still stalling,

which means he still doesn't have enough lift.

[stall warning horn beeps]

The aircraft's still not ready to fly.

You're forcing it to take off.

And now you're hitting trees, and you keep flying?

[plane engine revs]

Not very realistic.

I do tend to leap before I look.

Sky Law, 30 Rock.

Steward.

2118 that guy.

Excuse me.

Mr. Sweatpants.

We're gonna need to check that bag.

And that is Sky Law.

No, there's no such thing as Sky Law per se,

or codes that we use with flight attendants.

As a matter of fact, most of the times

when we get on an aircraft to fly it,

we're meeting the crew for the first time in our lives.

Excuse me young lady, are you old enough

to be traveling alone?

So Matt Damon in this scene, is acting all like,

has all this authority as captain of the aircraft.

Is impressing Tina Fey. Roger that.

And is wearing the wrong hat.

[bell dings]

He's the captain of the aircraft,

he is wearing a co-pilot hat.

You wanna know a little pilot's secret,

besides the fact that we get discount at Sunglass Hut?

Pilots get discounts at a lot of places.

Sunglass Hut at the airport is actually one of them.

But pilots get pretty much discounted

all the retail outlets and food stores, restaurants

at the airport.

Didn't they say half an hour over an hour ago.

So 30-minute rule.

People are starting to get a little antsy back there.

Yeah, it's gonna be about another half hour.

I wish I could say it never existed.

However, I can now say with a lot of confidence and faith,

looking into your eyes, that we're not doing it anymore.

The half hour thing it's a trick.

It's enough time so that people know

they're gonna have to wait, but it doesn't upset them.

And can you tell me when we might be in the air captain?

Sure, in about a half an hour.

So when I as a captain give out any information

it is pretty much exactly what I know.

Oh folks half an hour means forever, oh.

Bird strike, Sully.

[plane engine revs]

Well you know the only way

to get out of LaGuardia on time?

What's that?

Fly outta JFK.

The flight attendants complaining

about how awful LaGuardia is, is very accurate.

The nickname for LaGuardia in the industry

is LaGarbage. Funny.

A lot of reasons though LaGuardia is hated

are the similar reasons

why most passengers don't like it either,

it's an airport that's overgrown its capacity.

A little bit of weather causes extensive delays.

Once you've landed the taxi time

is gonna be a few hours.

Go easy.

I love LaGuardia.

My favorite airport in the whole, wide world is LaGuardia.

Fuel verified, 19,000 pounds required we 21.8 on board.

19,000 pounds required 21.8 on board.

The pilot and co-pilot, when they're taking the runway

that conversation that's happening, it's not conversation,

it's not talking, it's pure business.

Go. Go the center.

It's called a sterile flight deck.

Pilots cannot talk to each other, have any conversation,

that's not about the particular flight

they're flying, until the aircraft

is above 10,000 feet.

It may seem like, why is there a need for two people

to say the same thing.

19,000 pounds required, we got 21.8 on board.

19,000 pounds required, 21.8 on board.

The first officer as the pilot flying

calls out 19,000 pounds required, 21.8 on board.

The captain verifies it.

It's called a take-off fuel, or minimum take-off fuel

for that matter.

Birds.

Whoa.

[birds clatter]

The aircraft is designed to withstand a certain limit,

or number of bird strikes.

There's no hard and fast limit for it but,

it's not like the engine just one small bird

will bring the airplane down.

Get out the QRH, lost the thrust in both engines.

QRH is the Quick Reference Handbook.

Any abnormal situation is handled by the QRH.

It's like a cookbook.

It is a step-by-step-by-step what to do.

Mayday, mayday, mayday, this is cactus 1529,

we hit birds.

Once an aircraft says mayday, he owns everything.

Every help is available to him.

Teterboro tower, I need a runway.

Cactus 1549 needs to go to the airport right now.

Newark tower, what have you got?

[Man] We have runway 29 cleared and ready.

You need emergency landing?

Yes.

They're giving him every option.

They stop the airspace.

They give him every airport, every runway

that's available to him.

They'll tell you everything they know that will help you

make a good decision.

[Man] Cactus 1549 turn right 280.

You can land runway one Teterboro.

We can't make it.

If you look at this flight,

everything that has happened in it was very good,

it was superior airmanship as we call it

and that's why it led to the result that it did.

They followed all the right steps

that should have been followed.

Ignition start.

I'm startin' the AP now.

And you see the result that came out of it.

[plane splashes]

Emergency landing, Con Air.

We got one engine shot to [beep], zero fuel,

and we're droppin' too fast.

The Strip's where I'm gonna land,

only the word is crash.

Landing on the Las Vegas Strip, bad idea.

Out of all the places in Las Vegas

what they could have picked, the Strip was the worst.

They were insane.

Being a pilot is not just physically flying the aircraft.

A lot of it is the decision making.

Las Vegas airport, it's just past the Strip.

Can you see it?

Well Viva Las Vegas.

So right at this spot, where they are,

they're pretty much lined up with McCarran Airport.

It's right there man you can make it.

So they're facing west in that shot.

McCarran Airport has two runways, runway 19 left,

and 19 right, which is just to their left.

All they hadda do was make a left turn,

and they had a straight shot to that runway.

[metal clatters] [people yell]

As soon as they hit the guitar at the Hard Rock Cafe,

they lose half their wing.

They actually lose an aileron, which is a control surface

that controls the roll movement of an aircraft.

The roll movement would be this movement of the aircraft.

[dramatic music]

If they lose the left aileron on the left part of the wing

that should be end of that flight.

The airplane should not be able to maintain

level flight after that.

It should go into a roll right away.

[metal clatters] [dramatic music]

Landing on Las Vegas Strip was the worst of the ideas

a pilot could make.

Ah shucks.

Air traffic control, Saturday Night Live.

All right, no there's Ted Talk for monikers big man.

I know you're coming out all peelie wallie up there,

but I'm gonna have you doin' your skate

faster than a whip against a hawthorn okay?

[audience laughs]

What?

English is English, but it comes with all kinds of accents

from all over the world.

One of the harder ones is actually Scottish is hard.

I'm so sorry, your accent is very thick.

Is it possible to not have it, over?

You can also ask them to repeat,

but there is only so many times you can ask them to repeat

before annoying them.

What's he comin' in at?

And they can also be busy,

so it's not like you can just ask

for them to repeat everything.

Have a wee shifty out the window down at the ground,

tell me if you can rest your goggles

upon Auckintoshin plane station.

The instructions are standardized.

I'm expecting a certain type of instructions about to come.

Every instruction usually contains a heading,

altitude, or a speed.

I have an idea what's coming, but if it was actually

legit aviation instructions coming,

I probably would have been able to understand it.

I should be able to understand it.

[man speaking in a foreign language]

[audience laughs] What?

So I am speaking with a perspective of being

an American person going into other countries.

But I have heard a lot of complaints from foreign pilots

that when they come to New York, especially Kennedy

they have the hardest time with air traffic control

for two reasons.

One it's American English.

Second, New Yorkers speak really fast.

And third, JFK or New York airspace is one of the most

complicated airspace systems in the world.

They're dealing with a lot of traffic

and the operation is very fast.

So all of that is difficult to understand.

Say again.

Loss of flight control, Flight.

[people scream]

Power back, power back.

[Automated Voice] Stingray pull up.

Stingray pull up.

As soon as the aircraft goes in a nose dive,

the aircraft starts screaming, Whoop, whoop, pull up.

Stingray pull up.

That doesn't happen at high altitudes.

That is a system in an aircraft

that stops it from impact when it is close to ground,

or close to structures, or close to terrain.

At 30,000 feet the aircraft does not say pull up.

It's just adding drama and chaos to the scene.

We need to dump the fuel, do it!

Fuel dump is only on very large airplanes

that carry fuel for hours and hours and hours.

Domestic airplanes that have a range of four or five hours

don't have fuel dumps on them.

[siren whoops] [fuel sprays]

It's not like a light switch on and off.

You turn the fuel dump on and all of a sudden

the entire aircraft is out of fuel, it takes time.

Think you can reach my side?

[siren whoops]

I can't reach it.

Pilots are there to fly the aircraft.

They can reach every switch and button

from where they're sitting at their station, buckled in.

Stay strapped in, stay strapped in.

Margaret! Margaret!

They don't need Margaret to come for that manual control

which does not even exist on that aircraft.

This movie was made post 9/11.

In the United States post 9/11,

the flight deck door is not open.

The flight attendant is not going in and out,

just like it's a walk in the park.

Oh Lord Jesus we're inverted.

Brian listen, we're level,

we can maintain altitude like this.

We're losin' oil pressure, both failure, both engines.

We're all right, we're flyin'.

Fire in the left engine. Put it out.

Let's talk about that fire.

The first officer in a very scared way said,

oh my God, we have the right engine on fire.

Oh no, fire in the right now.

So he goes ahead and pulls that one lever

that's lit up all red.

Once you pull that handle you shut that engine off.

Then, a few seconds later the first officer,

once again all freaking out says, we just lost an engine.

We lost the left engine.

Of course you lost an engine, you just shut them off.

There should be no power.

There should be electricity on the airplane,

everything should go dark.

They shouldn't be able to have any radio communication.

The very next thing is he asks Margaret,

Margaret full power.

[engine blasts]

You just shut those engines off.

What are you adding power to?

We're gonna roll it okay.

What do you mean roll it?

Gotta do something to stop this dive.

So this aircraft has a problem,

but it is in an uncontrolled nose dive situation.

The captain decides to fly the aircraft inverted

so he can stop losing that altitude

that they're losing extra fast.

That makes sense.

[engine revs]

Gear up. Gear up.

[engine revs]

They go inverted, they arrest the rate of descent,

buy themselves time, and all is fine.

But ow when the come out of that inverted flight,

or back level again,

We lost all power.

How did the aircraft not go

back into a nose dive right away?

Are we glidin'?

[Automated Voice] Too low terrain.

Too low terrain.

They have not fixed the problem.

All that engine shutting down and the fire shutting down

and all the drama that just happened

has not corrected the problem.

The problem still exists.

This is a very peculiar situation,

not something that you train for every day.

Like a video game right.

But it has to have rhyme or reason

and logic behind doing what you're doing,

which does not exist in this scene.

[Co-Pilot] Oh Lord.

Can't help you now brother.

Gun fight, Non-Stop.

[engine revs] [people scream]

[bullet blasts] [people scream]

So there's one gunshot fired.

A bullet goes through the window of the aircraft.

There's wind like there's a hurricane inside the cabin.

One small bullet hole will not make so much wind

and debris flying all over the cabin.

[wind whooshes] [people scream]

The bullet hole was not enough to cause a rapid

decompression in the cabin, but the loss of the window did.

There's rapid decompression and the oxygen masks come down,

which is a correct depiction.

But, how did the window just decide to fly out.

There's no good reasoning behind that.

[plane engine whines]

8,000 feet, come on, come on.

Those panels that are lifting up when the aircraft

is going down are actually speed brakes.

He is tryin' to get the airplane down fast

in the shortest amount of time.

8,000!

[plane engine whines]

The maneuver they're showing you is not coherent

with that weightless situation.

To get the aircraft weightless,

you would actually do the opposite.

You climb the aircraft.

When you reach the top of the climb, when you push back down

is when you get weightless.

[engine thumps]

Commercial airliners are not designed to be flown

in a weightless situation.

None of that should have happened.

You're right, I failed.

Unruly passenger, Meet the Parents.

You know what, get your grubby little paws

off of my bag, okay?

It's not like I have a bomb in here.

It's not like I wanna blow up the plane.

No, we still cannot say the word bomb.

There are certain trigger words that get attention

and bomb is one of them.

Bomb, bomb bomb, bomb, bomb, ba bomb.

Bomb, bomb, ba bomb, bomb, ba bomb, bomb.

In this particular scene, the flight attendant

was very, very nice and she let this go

much further than it would have in real life.

Take those little sticks outta your head,

clean out your ears, and maybe you would see

that I'm a person who has feelings

and all I have to do is do what I wanna do

and all I wanna do is hold onto my bag

and not listen to you.

We'll get someone on the aircraft,

something very similar to this saying,

Oh I swear my bag fits, it will fit, it always fits.

It fit in the previous flight.

The only way that I would ever let go of my bag

would be if you came over here right now

and tried to pry it from my dead, lifeless fingers.

Not everybody is there to get you, or is against you.

[man yells]

This happens more often than people can think.

Pilot schedules, LA to Vegas.

What's your problem man?

My problem right now is that I'm talking to

an overrated hack whose stick work is pedestrian.

What did you say?

So basically what he's tryin' to say

is you're not that good of a pilot.

That is a big insult for a pilot.

I was never serious about taking over

this God forsaken flight.

I mean come on Dave look at me, I fly international.

There is some unwritten prestige involved.

The pilots who come off of international flights,

somehow they have to just say,

Hey I'm just coming from London.

I just landed from Paris.

I have done that, and I see others do that.

So, it's there.

I fly international.

Okay, stop calling it international Steve.

Let's call it what it is, it's Canada.

He's actually right.

For the purposes of airline international pilot schedules,

Canada is not considered an international destination,

neither is Mexico.

Well that counts, they have their own money.

That doesn't even fit in wallets.

Engine fire, Air Force One.

[radar warning beeps]

[plane engine revs]

[man speaks in a foreign language]

[dramatic music]

So the Air Force One is intercepted by Migs.

Mig is a Russian fighter jet.

[dramatic music] [bullets blast]

If there's an aircraft with more than one engine,

losing an engine is not a huge big emergency

that is going to make you fall out of the sky.

I got it.

Right after that he says,

well we're turning to the right.

Moving right.

Very typical response in an engine failure.

There is less stress on the right side

than the left side.

Naturally, the aircraft will rotate towards the right

which is happening in this case.

Left rudder, you have to compensate.

Pull back that number one engine.

Negative, slow down, you have to trim it out.

Harrison Ford's first remark is, oh should I pull

number one engine back.

Should I pull back that number one engine?

Which is a good idea for someone who's not a pilot.

However, we don't take away the power

that we already have on an engine,

or the thrust that's being produced.

Negative, slow down.

How we compensate for it is by the use of rudder.

Left rudder, you have to compensate.

Rudder is a flight control surface

that controls this motion of the aircraft.

Kind where the nose yawing towards the right side

you would apply left rudder.

Once you've lost an engine

for the entire duration of the flight,

you'll have hold that rudder in to keep the nose like this.

As soon as you release the pressure on your leg,

or if your leg gets tired,

the airplane will turn back towards the right again.

You have to trim it out.

How do I do that?

The trim is just relieving the pressure

the pilot has on the rudder holding it in.

It's like riding a bike.

Out running DEA plane, American Made

[ Barry] Holy God!

[Man] This is the United States Drug Enforcement

Administration, we are ordering you to land immediately.

[Barry] The DEA was using these fancy new jets

that we couldn't out run.

Tom Cruise is in a smaller aircraft

which consumes or burns less gas

as opposed to the fancy jet that the DEA is flying.

[Barry] They could go fast,

but we could go slow,

for a long time.

So he forces them to come down at a lower altitude,

fly slower, burn more gas.

Aircrafts do burn more gas when they're lower and slower

as opposed to flying higher and faster.

And that is why all the commercial flights

are flown around 30,000 some feet.

[warning signal bongs]

[Automated Voice] Low Fuel.

We gotta turn around guys.

No you don't wait that long.

If you're waiting for the aircraft to tell you low fuel,

you're way behind the aircraft to begin with.

We're bingo.

So bingo fuel is where you would not continue

what you're doing and just go and land the aircraft

to bring it back on the ground.

[Man] Time to head home.

Maximum altitude, The Crown.

May I?

You have control.

I have control.

So let's talk about how Prince Philip takes control

of the aircraft from the pilot who is flying it,

who's also a trained pilot.

It was done very professionally.

You have control.

I have control.

It's visually and verbally verified.

It's not like, I'll fly a little bit, you fly a little bit.

[Pilot] Sir, the service ceiling for this aircraft

is 45,000 feet.

The service ceiling of the aircraft

is a fixed, definite number published

in the aircraft manuals.

The absolute ceiling of the aircraft is a variable number

that depends on the temperature of that given day,

the weight of the aircraft and other environmental factors.

In fact if conditions are favorable,

the aircraft can climb from the service ceiling

to the absolute ceiling.

You and I both know it's safe to climb way beyond that.

Do not do this at home.

[engine rumbles]

It is not a practice that's common.

Is it doable? Yes.

And that's exactly what Prince Philip is saying

in the scene.

The difference between how fast the airplane can go

and how slow the airplane can go becomes very little

at that high altitude, which we in aviation terms

call the coffin corner.

We're currently at the very limit

of what this aircraft can do.

Exactly what the pilot in that scene says,

we're operating this aircraft to the very limit right now.

[Philip] God isn't it beautiful.

[bell dings]

If you have ever thought about flying,

if you've ever looked up in the sky

and seen an airplane and think, I wish I'd been there,

the only one recommendation I can give you is do it.

The feelings that you have

when you're soaring above the clouds,

that is a feeling that is indescribable.