Comments on: Is Denzel’s Upside-Down Flying Trick Plausible?

By: Ron

Ron — Sun, 19 May 2013 04:17:35 +0000

Did anybody noticed that the stabilizer was not in nose down position in neither of two scenes that aircraft tail was shown?

By: Don Hillberg

Don Hillberg — Sun, 12 May 2013 20:09:29 +0000

What? No Auto pilot? Airplane had him! I want my $7.75 back ! Auot could of saved the day ! After getting reinflated !

By: Dan

Dan — Tue, 16 Apr 2013 03:07:21 +0000

I’m a flight controls engineer. First off, the horizontal stabilizer is not the same as the elevator. The HSTA (horizontal stabilizer trim actuator) jackscrew was at fault for the crash in the movie, but that would not cause frozen elevators, only frozen elevator trim or uncommanded stabilizer movement, or possibly the loss of the horiz stab. The elevators should have been free to move. All airplanes have some form of backup pitch control. Second, the handles in the cockpit were most likely left and right aileron and/or elevator disconnects. These handles appear in some cockpits to separate the left and right control surfaces in the event of a jam on one side of the control system. Also, it was not a handle for reversion to manual controls. Hydraulically boosted flight controls are designed to revert to manual control automatically upon hydraulic failure via manual reversion linkage that bypasses the hydraulic actuators.

By: Jubal

Jubal — Thu, 04 Apr 2013 23:18:58 +0000

Just some observations about this movie’s borrowing:

1) “Whip” – Named for “Whip Russell”, the hero of Martin Caidin’s eponymously titled book. (I’m sure most airplane enthusiasts heard of him.)

2) “Pilots who attempted to duplicate the crash landing all failed and crashed the plane” – this happened after the Sioux City crash landing.

3) “Stripped jackscrew” and flying inverted – as noted by many, the Alaska Air crash.

By: george

george — Wed, 03 Apr 2013 09:31:53 +0000

im a professional fire fighter…. would you like to hear about every little flaw in every movie ever made with a fire fighting scene??
its hollywood, just watch the movie and accept it for what they ALL are… ENTERTAINMENT!!!

By: Alex

Alex — Sun, 31 Mar 2013 07:07:11 +0000

Believe it or not many Captains perform the walk around regardless on weather, seems like at American Airlines it all depends on who is the pilot flying for that leg but I’ve seen plenty of Captains doing the walk while working on the ramp. At Eagle I’ve heard of Captains doing the post flight walk (required at mx stations) for the FO if the FO has a tight deadheading connection to make.

By: Khandan

Khandan — Sat, 30 Mar 2013 04:34:09 +0000

Many years ago when I was at the Village of Goli, while playing Jai Alai, I witnessed a plane to take a similar dive. Later I found out that the pilot had suffered from a cardiac arrest.

By: MIke

MIke — Fri, 29 Mar 2013 18:59:20 +0000

If you think movie this stretched the truth a bit, then from this 24 year railroaders view, the Denzel movie “unstoppable” ripped it from end to end. I will see flight in the near future and glad I read this page for some insight into the realism or lack thereof. On another note, I have seen many pilots do a walk around on the flights that I have taken, I guessed it was required, surprised it isn’t.

By: dw

dw — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 11:07:38 +0000

He stumbles slightly on the first step after doing the walk-around, as he mounts the stairs to climb back to the cockpit. So the point of the walk-around sequence (leading to the stumble) is probably to show his inebriated state is affecting his performance to some extent.

By: Jay

Jay — Thu, 14 Mar 2013 06:36:22 +0000

I will have a go on my virtual pilot sim. I feel safer that way!! ‘)
Thanks for a great article and video…I really enjoyed it!
Cheers
Jay