00:00On the night of August 24th, 2001, an air transit flight took off from Toronto to Lisbon.
00:07At 39,000 feet over the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, both engines of the plane suddenly shut down because they had run out of fuel.
00:16All that was visible below was water, and the nearest airport was 120 kilometers away, making it impossible to reach.
00:25It seemed like there was only one outcome.
00:29Death.
00:30Was there a miraculous twist to this flight?
00:33Let's dive into this terrifying story that will leave you shocked.
00:38On the evening of August 23rd, 2001, Canadian Airlines air transit flight from Toronto was getting ready to head to Lisbon, Portugal from the airport.
00:50Since it was going to be a seven-hour non-stop flight, they loaded 48 metric tons of fuel after doing the regular service and maintenance checks.
01:00The aircraft was an Airbus A330, which was considered the most advanced and safest plane at that time.
01:07Captain Robert Pish, who was 48 years old, had 16,800 flight hours under his belt, while the first officer, Degar, had also flown for 4,800 hours.
01:21Both of them had flown the Airbus A330 many times before.
01:27In no time, the flight had 293 passengers on board.
01:32Thirteen crew members board the plane, and around 9 p.m., it takes off from Toronto Airport.
01:40The pilot slowly turns towards the Atlantic Ocean, heading for Lisbon.
01:45Just a few minutes in, the plane reaches its cruising altitude of 39,000 feet.
01:52On long flights like this, the pilot doesn't have to do much, since most of the work is handled by the autopilot system.
02:00The pilot mainly monitors the situation and periodically updates the control tower about their location.
02:06Four hours have passed since the flight took off, and everything has been normal so far.
02:13Most of the passengers on the plane were fast asleep when, in just a few minutes, the aircraft reached the middle of the Atlantic Ocean.
02:20That's when Captain Robert Pish noticed something strange on the control panel of engine number two.
02:27The readings were off, which set off alarm bells.
02:31Around 1 a.m., the pilot saw that the oil pressure in the right engine had shot up,
02:37while the oil quantity was low, and the oil temperature was reading low as well.
02:43Both pilots were seeing this kind of error for the first time in their careers.
02:46Because, whether it's a scooter or a plane, when an engine runs for a long time, its temperature usually rises.
02:55But here, the temperature was dropping rapidly, which was definitely not normal.
03:01So both pilots immediately check the flight manual, but they find nothing helpful.
03:07Without wasting any time, one pilot calls the Maintenance Control Center of Air Transit in Canada and explains the problem.
03:14All they get in response is to keep monitoring the error.
03:20As soon as we find out anything about this, we'll get in touch with you.
03:24Even though the cockpit was showing faulty readings, there weren't any problems during the flight.
03:30So the pilot relaxed, thinking maybe a faulty sensor was giving a wrong oil reading.
03:35But what happened next was an incident that's still written in black letters in aviation history.
03:42Anyway, about half an hour passed, and then another advisory message popped up on the cockpit screen in front of the captain.
03:50This one wasn't about oil. It was related to fuel.
03:54Actually, commercial airlines have fuel evenly distributed in their wings.
04:00But the screen showed a warning that there was less fuel in the right wing compared to the left wing.
04:06However, the pilot didn't think it was a big deal because warnings can pop up even when the fuel difference is just a few liters.
04:13So, he opened the cross-field valve to balance the fuel between the wings, and this time he did the same thing, evening out the fuel.
04:23But then, after about ten minutes, the captain saw a low fuel warning on the display.
04:30They only realized when they checked that the fuel in the right wing had dropped again.
04:34And now, even combining the fuel from both wings, they didn't have enough to reach Lisbon.
04:41At that moment, the plane only had seven tons of fuel left, which was just six percent of the total capacity, and it was running low fast.
04:51The pilot had no choice but to divert the plane, so they decided to land at Leas Airport on the nearby Dasara Island,
04:59and immediately got in touch with the traffic control there.
05:02The conversation went like this.
05:05Both pilots were really worried about why the fuel was running low and whether they would even make it to Las Vegas Airport.
05:12The captain quickly told the flight attendant to check the right wing through the window to see if there was any fuel leaking.
05:19But it was so dark out that the flight attendant couldn't see anything.
05:24The situation was dire, with one ton of fuel running out every five minutes, and they only had about 25 minutes worth left.
05:32It was clear that reaching the Tersara Island was looking bleak.
05:36That's when the maintenance team spoke to the captain.
05:40The suggestion was made to take the plane up to 20,000 feet to confirm the fuel leak.
05:45But the captain flat out refused.
05:47He figured that even if we confirmed the leak, we wouldn't be able to maintain 39,000 feet.
05:54And at least if we could glide from 39,000 feet, we could cover a few more kilometers.
06:00Suddenly, the right engine caught fire, confirming the leak.
06:04This caused chaos among the passengers inside, and the plane started shaking.
06:11That's when the captain told everyone to stay calm and sit tight.
06:14The plane had only 45 tons of fuel left and just one engine, making it impossible to cruise a plane of that size.
06:23Gradually, the plane's altitude started to drop.
06:26There were only 600 grams of fuel left, and it was still 240 kilometers from its destination.
06:35Just as the captain feared, the left engine burned out due to running at full throttle,
06:41leaving the flight gliding over the Atlantic Ocean without any engines.
06:46The power system also failed, plunging the entire cabin into darkness,
06:50although the cockpit had all the important equipment running on emergency support.
06:56The airport was 120 kilometers away, and the plane had descended to 30,000 feet.
07:04If the plane couldn't glide to the airport, it would have to land in the water, which is risky.
07:10So the crew members quickly started prepping the passengers.
07:14Landing in the water can be really dangerous because of the impact,
07:18and even if they survived that, they could still drown.
07:23Gliding a big commercial plane is really tough.
07:26It's all about keeping everything in the air.
07:30The control system was dependent on the pilot, who was manually adjusting the lever.
07:35The plane's altitude was dropping at 200 feet per minute,
07:39meaning the 306 people on board were facing the possibility of life or death within the next 15 minutes.
07:46A few minutes later, the distance between the plane and the airport had reached 15 kilometers.
07:53At that distance, it's recommended to keep the flight altitude at 3,000 feet,
07:59but this plane was still at 13,000 feet.
08:03If the captain had tilted the plane forward to quickly lower the altitude,
08:07there was a 90% chance of a crash landing.
08:10In that situation, the pilot made a 360-degree turn right there,
08:18which kept the distance between the plane and the airport the same.
08:22But the altitude dropped from 8,000 feet to 5,000 feet.
08:27That's still 2,000 feet above the recommended level.
08:30And since a 360-degree turn wasn't an option anymore,
08:34the pilot turned the plane towards the airport runway and did a few S-turns.
08:40This zigzag pattern gave the plane some extra time to lower its altitude.
08:45Normally, during landing, they use flaps and engine thrust to keep the nose of the plane up.
08:51The pilot couldn't deploy the flaps without engine thrust,
08:55because doing that would have increased drag from the air,
08:58causing the plane to tilt forward and crash.
09:00So, the pilot decided to land with the flaps off,
09:05which led to a pretty hard impact between the plane and the runway.
09:09In just 12 minutes, eight tires blew out,
09:13and the plane started skidding to the side.
09:16But the captain wisely applied the brakes slowly.
09:19And finally, the plane came to a stop.
09:23Just then, there was a huge explosion in the landing gear, which caught fire.
09:28Even though the emergency crew near the runway quickly put out the fire,
09:33the brave pilot of Air Transat Flight 236 saved the lives of 306 passengers.
09:41To this day, it's the only plane in history that glided for so long without any engines
09:46and still managed to reach its destination.
09:50But the big question was, what went wrong?
09:53When they investigated, it turned out that during maintenance in Toronto before takeoff,
09:59the engineers had changed a part of the plane's engine, and it didn't fit perfectly.
10:04That's why the engine started to vibrate in that part,
10:08which caused the nearby fuel line to burst.
10:11The pilot also messed up by not paying enough attention to the fuel leak
10:15and leaving the cross-feed valve open for too long,
10:19which led to fuel from engine 1 leaking into engine 2 and running out of fuel.
10:26What would you do in that situation?
10:29Let us know!
10:31You can check out more videos like this on our channel.
10:34Thanks!
10:35You can check out more videos like this on our channel.
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