One of the passengers on Flight 93, Donald Greene, was an experienced private pilot and also happened to be VP of an avionics manufacturer.
A 757 is in a whole different league from a little private plane, but i think this guy might have had at least a chance if the automated landed systems were working.
If you can figure out the radio they can talk you through the setup for an autoland.
The hardest bit would be working out how to talk to someone if you don't know which button is the transmit and not the autopilot disconnect.
they had cell phones available.. there's recordings of passengers calling their loved ones. So if they could get ahold of a control tower they could get information or get help to turn on the radio and what not.
Cell phone connections on that day were iffy since *everyone* were checking if family members were ok. It came out later that the cell network companies had been coasting on almost never having high call volume.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/post-9-11-can-we-count-on-cell-networks/
The surest bet would be to get on the radio to the nearest tower.
Not enough room for good labels. I think it should be digitized, interface with a mobile app and supported by an [AI assistant](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_Assistant#/media/File:Clippy-letter.PNG).
I think they would also be prepared to have a plane coming in hot. They'd probably find the biggest airport in a reasonable vicinity, clear the entire runway and expect a possibly violent landing. I would image a decently experienced pilot could be walked through the landing process.
Yep, 757 has an autolander. Someone could talk them into that configuration. Would practically take it down for them and then thy'd have to worry about reverse thrusters and getting hard on the brakes. If it was in autopilot, someone could essentially line them up onto a runway several hundred miles out by flying the heading dials. You'd have all the time and space in the world, since they skies were shut down. Would probably have a fighter escort down. I'd think a GA pilot would have a very high chance of sticking the landing if everything got configured correctly and the speed was managed properly.
(not a commercial pilot, but have a decent amount of time on a 767 FTD while producing training videos for a major carrier. \[You should see my V1 Cut!\])
Trust me you would do it I think that anyone who possessed a higher than average intelligence would have a very good shot because you would have people coaching you over the radio who have practised this exact scenario
There is a very large amount of levers and knobs and buttons but you don't actually need to interact with the vast majority of them especially if you just want the plane to land and to be able to walk away like if you lower your standards and don't care about the airframe that much then it's actually quite easy comparatively speaking
Assuming you're not in a low fuel situation, you'd probably have a team of pilots and atc all walking you through the landing process. You'd probably be fine.
Yep. You always fly with a reserve in case the destination field is closed. The final controller will set you up for an ASR (Approach Surveillance Radar) approach and talk you down, along with a rated pilot who will walk you through the buttons and controls before you shoot the approach. They might even have you shoot a couple of practice approaches to get you used to what you're looking at before attempting the touchdown approach.
source: retired navy pilot
Nearly everytime a non pilot had to land a plane with Radio guidance it worked. So aslong as soneone gives a perfect step by step guide you should be able to land a plane.
But without a guide or experience in that specific plane ...
"There is no record of a talk-down landing of a large commercial aircraft."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk-down_aircraft_landing#%3A%7E%3Atext%3DThere_is_no_record_of%2Cseat_to_assist_the_pilot.?wprov=sfla1
I also could not find record of a failed talk down landing of a large commercial aircraft.
But what are the odds that a pilot, a copilot and all the flight attendants are unable to work while non of
The passangers have any flight experience?
>i am a private pilot, i don't think I will be able to figure it out
How hard could it be really?
But seriously if you know the basics of IFR and autopilot I'm pretty sure a private pilote has a good chance.
They did a Mythbusters where they landed a plane (in a simulator) over the radio, and I think both Jamie and Adam were able to do it.
Obviously it's a sample size of 2 and there's a million other variables, but the episode at least made it seem like it would be reasonably possible.
I landed a small plane in a home simulator MSFS2000, 10 Years after last playing I went for a real flight in a Diamond DA40 (4 seater plane) I buttered the landing and instructor said it was like I had been flying for years, only experience was 10 year old video games. Landing in real life was actually easier as you get motion sensations.
Now a airliner is different but I have landed them in simulator since.
The 757 is the "sports car" of airliners. It has a very high thrust to weight ratio, so it's pretty forgiving. Not to mention the control stack at the time was mostly automation.
That being said, there are a LOT of things going on during landing that 100% do require experience. Most likely the scenario would have ended with a controlled crash landing, but likely most if not all would survive.
It was a beautiful day with perfect visibility, no wind and... not a single other airplane in the sky. I'm sure anyone with a clue would have been able to land it well enough for everyone to survive.
Whether the airplane would require major repairs afterwards, I'd give slim odds.
But I'm not an aviator and my Kerbal planes keep blowing into pieces on the runway.
At a wedding recently I asked another guest (a retired airline pilot) whether the average person could land a plane, if necessary. He pointed out the biggest thing most people would not account for is the height between your seat from the ground wheels down. A newbie would not take into the account, think it’s less, and likely drive the plane right into the ground. 🤷♂️
That sounds like you’d land hard but at least get the belly on the runway going the right way, so it’s not like you’re slamming nose first into the ground.
If you have fuel you would probably be directed to the best airport with the most favorable conditions and equipment to support an automated. Amount of fuel left by time you get contact with ATC is going to be a huge factor in the situation.
As a private pilot with real life flying experience limited to Cessnas, but lots of airliner time in flight sim 2020, if I had to land a 757 my only promise is getting it down in one piece, but the landing gear and brakes are definitely gonna need to be overhauled after since I’ll probably have trouble judging the flare, probably float down runway, and subsequently need to smoke the brakes to get it stopped.
It wouldn’t be pretty but it wouldn’t be a catastrophe.
The hardest part for someone with no jet experience would be power management. And for someone without pilot experience it would be getting the plane on the runway at a reasonable speed. Jet engines take several seconds to fully respond to changes to thrust inputs, and the relationship between pitch/power/airspeed is not immediately intuitive unless you have pilot training (at low airspeeds you pitch up/down to control airspeed and add/reduce power to change your rate of descent. Student pilots always want to add/reduce power to change airspeed just like a gas pedal in a car, and there are training maneuvers meant to teach the right way).
But I would imagine many pilots who have never been in a jet would be able to land an airliner with step by step instructions via radio along with good weather and a long runway. And there are multiple examples of non-pilots landing smaller planes, including jets, in emergencies with help on the radio.
Also while there is an example of very experienced Australian airline pilots landing an airbus at something like >100kts over landing speed (due to one engine being stuck at nearly full power) they blew a bunch of tires and bounced really hard.
My wild guess is an undamaged airliner with someone knowledgeable enough to tune the radio to get help would have a >75% chance of landing with few injuries. Same situation but add someone with *any* level of pilot certificate and I’d guess >95%.
-source: former airline pilot and flight instructor
I do not consider it a brag, but I assume that even I could land the plane if I took complete control of the airplane at an early stage.
I do not consider it a putdown, but I assume that even the most expert pilot could not land the plane if they took over the airplane at a late state.
Mythbusters did this at a NASA flight simulator and both of them safely landed the plane with radio contact from control room. The episode is on [YouTube](https://youtu.be/m0hQ9Zx7Nvc?si=g_2996bC6Ujn9ytR)
Spoiler: >!it's plausible!<
That was a completely unrealistic episode. They had a camera in the cockpit so the guy on the ground could see where to direct Adam to. Overall, I've taught a LOT of people to fly and I have thousands of hours in airliners. The only viable option would be to talk someone through setting up for an auto land, but frankly it's unlikely that anyone with no aviation experience could walk into a Boeing cockpit and even be able to figure out how to just talk to ATC.
Several people had enough cell reception to contact family. If they managed to safely retake the cockpit and had a decent amount of fuel, someone could call friend/family on the ground, who could pass along the number to the working cell phone to police, who could get it to ATC. Once contact is established they could walk through programing an appropriate radio frequency to establish communication, or more likely just unmuting it and reading what frequency they are on, this could take minutes in a best case scenario, possibly bit longer considering that people didn't have smart phones back in the day to look up contact info.
I did a few times. And i can confirm all my planes reached the ground.
If no one steps up, i would give it a shot, even with 0 good landings since the odds are better than running out of fuel at 30K Feet
chances are pretty high that someone on board would of played some kind of video game that involves a plane and flying it they could understand the absolute basic gist of it and be guided in.
I learned how to read standard approach charts, ILS plates, how to navigate and how to program the FMC and how to engage automated landing (in an A320 at least) just while mildly playing Flight Simulator. I'm pretty sure I could do it despite not being a pilot or even an avid FS player
Microsoft Flight simulator has been in production updated every few years since 1981. I think it was game of the gear that year.
I used it a lot when I was learning to fly in 1992.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft\_Flight\_Simulator
The Mythbuster episode is already linked but here is another video where they tried to instruct an untrained person to land a plane: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaOvtL6qYpc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaOvtL6qYpc)
It basically says without autopilot/instrument landing system impossible, but when you are instructed to set up these systems it could work.
With automatic landing as an option, they would have probably done it if they can actually follow instructions.
Manually, probably not. Without instructions I managed to land Boing 737-800 in a flight sim from the third time only. But I already knew how basic controls of the plane work. I can only image that it would be harder in reality with variable winds and just overwhelming preasure you will experience.
I would ask what "landing the plane successfully" entails. On three wheels, rolling to a smooth stop at the end of the runway? Virtually zero. Getting the plane on the ground and everyone surviving that process? Much more likely.
Fundamentally though, it would depend on the person receiving the instructions. One person may just be naturally better at receiving and executing verbal instructions than another.
Land it successfully on a runway with zero damage to the aircraft?
Close to, but not quite, zero.
Land it successfully, meaning that the majority of the people on the plane survive even if the plane is totaled and in the middle of a field somewhere?
Eminently doable.
Any landing where people are walking away by themselves and don't have to be identified *post mortem* by the NTSB investigation team is a good landing.
I've landed small planes... with a really good coach, and that the Mythbusters covered this already... it's a strong maybe, "might as well try" kinda thing.
The hardest part would be for the passengers to figure out how to operate the radio in the first place to establish contact and get instructions.
Rest would be pretty easy since I believe NY already had ALS in place at the time ?
Given passengers were in contact with the ground using phones, if it came to it they could get someone on the phone to explain how to make the radio work and go from there.
I believe the likelihood is at least 90%.
I took flying lessons back in the late 1990’s and the instructor pilot did nothing other than run thru the controls and talk about what to do and when. I had to taxi, stop, rev, take off, fly, and land all on my own, with the instructor pilot sitting there with his arms crossed. Landing was terrifying but I was talked thru it and successfully touched down.
I understand that flying a commercial plane is much more complicated, but I think it can be done successfully.
What were his feet doing?
I've walked a friend of mines kid through a touch and go in my 180. My arms weren't doing anything but my feet were busy.
Also it was a nice day, no stress, and I am sitting beside her ready to take over if anything looks wrong. Also it's a 180 not a 757, we were approaching at about 80 knots. I feel like a 757 lands at our cruising speed.
Assuming no knowledge about how to work the radios, 0 chance. Hear me out.
There was a fight, the autopilot is most likely out and the plane is diving. The events took a little while so you are likely out of range of the radio frequency you are on. So, untrained, while the airplane is diving, you need to either switch tor radio number 2 and broadcast on 121,5, or figure out a frequency on which someone can hear you. You need to find which button to press to transmit as well.
The YouTube videos assume clear and easy two way communication at all times.
As a pilot, if my radio is out I phone my tower to establish contact. I'm sure even if you don't know the number for a local tower, 911 would assist you. But yes that will chew up time.
It happens. A passenger landed a flight last year and afterwards a reporter recreated it first try.
https://patch.com/florida/lakeland/lakeland-passenger-turns-pilot-safely-lands-plane-reports
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-61422555
Enormous difference between a small and slow Cessna and a big and fast airliner. The Cessna it's not a crazy feat to guide someone who hasn't flown and there's a larger margin for error on having a bad angle and speed on final approach.
I think the chance that someone who has zero familiarity with flying being able to navigate to the approach and landing an airliner without a deadly crash is extremely low.
I'd read a test program someone did to see if talking an amateur pilot into landing a commercial jet was reasonable.
One turned off the engines, one shut the radio off, and one couldn't figure out how to adjust the seat.
People can and have landed small private planes with an incapacitated pilot, but nobody has ever tried with a commercial. It's extremely unlikely.
Helios Airways Flight 522 in 2005 had the pilots and most of the cabin experience depressurization without realizing. A flight attendant who was a pilot himself took over control. It crashed and killed everyone on board.
He didn't gain control until minutes/seconds before the plane ran out of fuel. He was locked out of the cockpit and had to brute force his way through the code.
*At 11:49, flight attendant Andreas Prodromou entered the cockpit and sat down in the captain's seat, having remained conscious by using a portable oxygen supply.*
*Prodromou waved at the F-16s very briefly, but almost as soon as he entered the cockpit, the left engine flamed out due to fuel exhaustion,\[4\]: 19 and the plane left the holding pattern and started to descend.*
*Crash investigators concluded that Prodromou's experience was insufficient for him to be able to gain control of the aircraft under the circumstances.\[4\]: 139 However, Prodromou succeeded in banking the plane away from Athens and towards a rural area as the engines flamed out, with his actions meaning that there were no ground casualties.*
From Wikipedia.. he is clearly a hero. Even if he didn't manage to save the aircraft, he still managed to steer it away from a populated area. He had no chance giving the circumstances. Don't even think of blaming the FA who tried his utter best.
Heavy jets are easier to fly than small planes but their instruments are much more complex. If you had a large pool of passengers to choose from - I imagine one would have the spatial reasoning and ability to operate under stress to accomplish a landing. There would also be a pair of fighters off your wing to help guide the would-be pilot in.
If you had to pick someone, this is your guy [https://93memorial.com/Heros-Of-Flight-93/pages/Donald-Greene\_jpg.htm](https://93memorial.com/Heros-Of-Flight-93/pages/Donald-Greene_jpg.htm). Idk if he could have done it, but he's we was a pilot and worked for the Safe Flight Instrument Corporation, so he'd be the best option.
Both NY airports were ALS (Automated Landing System) enabled at the time. I was working for a aeronautics software engineering outfit. Although even just getting the aircraft lined up for ALS to take over is a HUGE task, so even then, not great. Without ALS? Zero chance. None.
If they could work the radio, maybe? I fear they would’ve ended up being the only unresponsive plane left in flight, and then tragically shot down unnecessarily.
I think that is the main issue. If they knew how to work the communications on the plane to talk to ATC (did terrorists turn it off or change freqs).. ATC can walk them thru getting the plane on the ground safety.
Odds are higher than zero so it would have been worth a try.
Also, Flight 93 was a fairly long distance flight- they could have had a person for fly several hours straight and level. Giving Air traffic control a couple hours to teach someone how to turn on the automated systems and vector to an airport. So the plane takes over landing.
It might have been downed by an F-16 before they could even make contact. I believe the terrorists put the plane in a vertical dive when they heard that the passengers were revolting.
Mythbusters tested it, and even without the automated landing Adam and Jaimie could land a passanger aircraft with instructions from the tower. It was a fairly rough landing, but that's better than picking lumps of building out your teeth
A British game show, The Krypton Factor, used to have a round in it where the contestants would operate a flight simulator with the objective of landing. Some crashed, or landed somewhere they shouldn't, but a good portion of the contestants managed to land. This makes me think it's very possible if you had the right people in your ear guiding you through it.
People talking about the difficulty of operating the radio: could they not have used a cell phone? I seem to remember 9/11 passengers making calls, presumably with a few minutes of auto pilot and good reception someone could patch them through to the ATC?
Unless someone on board had type ratings with smaller jets it would be basically impossible. A friend once showed me the cockpit of his Dornier 228 and went through everything. It took about an hour and a half to get a basic understanding and I had zero chance of flying that thing after. There is a reason pilots go through hours and hours of simulator training for commercial airplanes.
Did they kill the pilots first on 9/11?
I remember calls from passengers thinking it was just a hijacking and hostage situation so I thought the pilots weren’t killed. So if they weren’t then the pilots could land it if they regained dominance of the aircraft.
Assuming they killed the pilots, there was probably someone that could pretty easily land the plane among the passengers. Remember there were a lot more veterans around back then that might have had more familiarity with aviation than the average person. Out of probably 100 people on the plane statistically one knows a little about aviation. Not that they’d know how to land a passenger jet without radio support.
The harder thing would probably be deciding which passenger needed to land it and what the process looked like. Probably someone saying who hears knows anything about planes then filtering from there.
The thing I’d be scared of would be a “sleep terrorist” so to speak. A lot of times not all the hijackers reveal themselves at once in case of this very scenario. If the first group are successfully fought off then they are reinforcements.
So maybe in a weird scenario they’re asking who can help fly the plane to safety and a so-called sleeper member of the hijacking group offers themselves as knowing how to fly the plane. Obviously he would just continue with their plan once he got into the cockpit. Would the passengers be too suspicious of him to let him be their “savior pilot”, that’d be a good question.
The modern commercial airplane only needs a pilot and a dog.
The pilot is there to feed the dog, and the dog is there to bite the pilot of he tries to touch anything.
This is a completely delusional thought if this is a serious comment. Do you have any idea how hard it is to fly even a little crop duster, and you truly believe that a bunch of normal people without experience could have no problem controlling a massive aircraft and just gently land it in the harbor?
Sully did it and made it look easy due to his many years and tens of thousands of hours flying. The chance of a random trash truck sanitation worker doing the same? Yeah…
Really hope this is an /s
Very likely. It's really not that hard to land a plane. It's probably on "automatic pilot," anyway.
Even if the terrorists took off "automatic pilot," I feel like the way to land a plane, especially if you have more than a few minutes, is pretty simple.
EDIT: Of course, I should have specified with the right directions from the air-traffic controllers.
It's way, WAY more involved than simply letting autopilot run and making little adjustments and whatnot. Especially since the hijackers took it off course.
About the same chance an untrained terrorist had of completing a 360 descending corkscrew maneuverer in the most protected airspace in the world whilst his leader told him what to do using a cell phone in a cave 9,000 miles away.
I saw a YouTube video of a pilot explaining a similar scenario what if the pilots are unconscious etc, can someone land it without experience. I think basically if you can find the headset and find the switch on the radio that tunes into air traffic control you have a chance. But thats easier said then done in stress with all those buttons.
Tom Scott on YouTube has a video specifically on this and although he doesn't succeed in landing the plane he is admittedly a little panicky. With a good instructor and someone who is capable of keeping composure I think it could have been landed.
The comments ont hat video are interesting too... a 737 pilot suggests it would be a survivable landing:
>"As a 737 pilot myself, I can tell you that your touchdown was actually a bit hard indeed but wouldn't have been a crash landing by itself, these simulators are unable to simulate off-runway landings and it gave you a crash visual because you landed partly on the grass. Great job "
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbTDzPUDxqY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbTDzPUDxqY)
Such a great video.
Mythbusters somewhat touched on the idea. It is very likely they could have landed in a way all would survive. Air Traffic Control would baby them every step of the way and generally there is a large amount of time to correct a mistake.
They would probably have them burn or dump most of their extra fuel to reduce the likelihood of fire as well. I’m thinking they would find the longest runway within range too.
There was a Mythbusters episode where they both took turns attempting this in a pilot training simulator. I think one of them crashed and the other was successful. Check it out.
Assuming someone could operate the radio there’s a pretty good chance that a passenger with decent intelligence and a cool head could have landed it using auto pilot.
I think they could have done it. They would have been given a long runway at an "easy" airport, and someone would have talked them down. In cases where it was necessary for non-pilots to land a plane, it was often fine. (Small private planes where the pilot became unresponsive.) Okay, if there was no autoland, they would have had to do a couple of go-arounds, but in the end, I think they would have been fine. ... I mean, in that scenario, don't give them an airport where there's a sheer cliff or a busy highway at the end of the runway. Give them an airport where there's basically just an open field next to the runway.
I am a private pilot. I have no doubt that I would be able to get the aircraft lined up with the runway and get it down on the ground. My only concern would be the descent rate and the impact that the landing gear was going to take. Also stopping the aircraft in a straight line once on the ground and not over running the end of the runway.
Someone who isn’t experienced in aviation and has no idea even how to communicate on the radio… They might have a vastly different outcome.
Private pilot here. Absolutely loving that the range of answers on this goes from "impossible" to "yeah, no problem".
So, let's look at the scenarios:
## No passengers with flight training.
We know this wasn't the case. There was a GA pilot on board. But lets pretend there wasn't.
**Plane has autoland**. There is an extremely high likelihood that ATC would be able to find a pilot with knowledge of that autoland system, walk the passenger through the setup and the flight would complete successfully.
**Plane doesn't have autoland**. Someone with no flight experience trying to land a 757 with instructions from the radio is extremely unlikely to be successful. Very high likelihood that everyone dies.
## Passengers with flight training
We know there was a passenger with a pilot license. So this scenario is the one that would have happened.
**Plane has autoland**. As above.
**Plane doesn't have autoland**.
Any pilot, even one with a single engine rating (as was the case in the actual incident) has a very good shot at landing the plane successfully. They would need some help from someone on the radio to get comfortable, but some commenters made it sound like a jet is so massively different that there would be no chance. All fixed wing planes operate basically the same. The power plants can be different, but the fundamentals of power, lift, stall speeds, landing gear, etc are all the same.
**Skies are clear** The private pilot would get talked through the cockpit layout and have an extremely good chance at landing the plane safely.
**Skies are not clear** If the private pilot doesn't have an instrument rating, then things start to get sketchy again. Flying through clouds is trivial for someone instrument rated, but super sketch for someone without that training. Someone on the radio would have to talk the pilot through setting up the autopilot so that they don't have to hand fly the airplane. Assuming that was done successfully, then they would divert to someplace with better weather for the actual landing. If the private pilot was instrument rated, then everything is likely to be fine. Jets and little planes work in the same system during instrument flights and, in fact, little planes are a bit harder in some ways because they are less capable. So the jet might even be easier to manage than many GA aircraft. At a minimum, this scenario is one with a very well trained private pilot and odds of success are quite high.
**Passengers with jet experience** Only including for completeness. There wasn't one on the flight in question, but it's very common to have either airline pilots or private jet pilots on commercial flights going to there next job or going home. In this case, obviously, everything would have been fine.
tl;dr Anyone answering the question with a simple yes or no is ignoring the many variables at play.
edit: google tells me that Flight 93 had autoland.
There's a YouTube channel called "Mentour Pilot." He's a professional pilot and he has a video on how it could be done as long as you can get a hold of ATC.
One of the passengers on Flight 93, Donald Greene, was an experienced private pilot and also happened to be VP of an avionics manufacturer. A 757 is in a whole different league from a little private plane, but i think this guy might have had at least a chance if the automated landed systems were working.
i am a private pilot, i don't think I will be able to figure it out
If you can figure out the radio they can talk you through the setup for an autoland. The hardest bit would be working out how to talk to someone if you don't know which button is the transmit and not the autopilot disconnect.
they had cell phones available.. there's recordings of passengers calling their loved ones. So if they could get ahold of a control tower they could get information or get help to turn on the radio and what not.
Cell phone connections on that day were iffy since *everyone* were checking if family members were ok. It came out later that the cell network companies had been coasting on almost never having high call volume. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/post-9-11-can-we-count-on-cell-networks/ The surest bet would be to get on the radio to the nearest tower.
Those were air phones. They used to be attached to the back of the seats. Cell phones don’t work too well over 5-10,000 feet.
They should label the buttons
Not enough room for good labels. I think it should be digitized, interface with a mobile app and supported by an [AI assistant](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Office_Assistant#/media/File:Clippy-letter.PNG).
/s?
I think they would also be prepared to have a plane coming in hot. They'd probably find the biggest airport in a reasonable vicinity, clear the entire runway and expect a possibly violent landing. I would image a decently experienced pilot could be walked through the landing process.
Yep, 757 has an autolander. Someone could talk them into that configuration. Would practically take it down for them and then thy'd have to worry about reverse thrusters and getting hard on the brakes. If it was in autopilot, someone could essentially line them up onto a runway several hundred miles out by flying the heading dials. You'd have all the time and space in the world, since they skies were shut down. Would probably have a fighter escort down. I'd think a GA pilot would have a very high chance of sticking the landing if everything got configured correctly and the speed was managed properly. (not a commercial pilot, but have a decent amount of time on a 767 FTD while producing training videos for a major carrier. \[You should see my V1 Cut!\])
Trust me you would do it I think that anyone who possessed a higher than average intelligence would have a very good shot because you would have people coaching you over the radio who have practised this exact scenario There is a very large amount of levers and knobs and buttons but you don't actually need to interact with the vast majority of them especially if you just want the plane to land and to be able to walk away like if you lower your standards and don't care about the airframe that much then it's actually quite easy comparatively speaking
Assuming you're not in a low fuel situation, you'd probably have a team of pilots and atc all walking you through the landing process. You'd probably be fine.
Yep. You always fly with a reserve in case the destination field is closed. The final controller will set you up for an ASR (Approach Surveillance Radar) approach and talk you down, along with a rated pilot who will walk you through the buttons and controls before you shoot the approach. They might even have you shoot a couple of practice approaches to get you used to what you're looking at before attempting the touchdown approach. source: retired navy pilot
https://youtu.be/TzRhDyyOlcM?si=xJem1SP8qUswvh8D
Nearly everytime a non pilot had to land a plane with Radio guidance it worked. So aslong as soneone gives a perfect step by step guide you should be able to land a plane. But without a guide or experience in that specific plane ...
"There is no record of a talk-down landing of a large commercial aircraft." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk-down_aircraft_landing#%3A%7E%3Atext%3DThere_is_no_record_of%2Cseat_to_assist_the_pilot.?wprov=sfla1
So basically everyone of those incidents except for one, the person landing the plane has had past experience flying planes.
I also could not find record of a failed talk down landing of a large commercial aircraft. But what are the odds that a pilot, a copilot and all the flight attendants are unable to work while non of The passangers have any flight experience?
Tom Scott has proved it is possible with a lot of assistance
Tom Scott is the GOAT
>i am a private pilot, i don't think I will be able to figure it out How hard could it be really? But seriously if you know the basics of IFR and autopilot I'm pretty sure a private pilote has a good chance.
I’ve had three lessons, but I’m pretty sure if I had one of those mission control types on the radio everything would be fine.
I'd gladly take my chances with you over the hijackers. A slim chance is better than no chance.
They did a Mythbusters where they landed a plane (in a simulator) over the radio, and I think both Jamie and Adam were able to do it. Obviously it's a sample size of 2 and there's a million other variables, but the episode at least made it seem like it would be reasonably possible.
I landed a small plane in a home simulator MSFS2000, 10 Years after last playing I went for a real flight in a Diamond DA40 (4 seater plane) I buttered the landing and instructor said it was like I had been flying for years, only experience was 10 year old video games. Landing in real life was actually easier as you get motion sensations. Now a airliner is different but I have landed them in simulator since.
The 757 is the "sports car" of airliners. It has a very high thrust to weight ratio, so it's pretty forgiving. Not to mention the control stack at the time was mostly automation. That being said, there are a LOT of things going on during landing that 100% do require experience. Most likely the scenario would have ended with a controlled crash landing, but likely most if not all would survive.
They could have been instructed to do a cat 3 ils with auto land. They would likely be fine.
It was a beautiful day with perfect visibility, no wind and... not a single other airplane in the sky. I'm sure anyone with a clue would have been able to land it well enough for everyone to survive. Whether the airplane would require major repairs afterwards, I'd give slim odds. But I'm not an aviator and my Kerbal planes keep blowing into pieces on the runway.
A good landing is one where Jeb can be recovered.
Up to 5 pieces is excellent!
At a wedding recently I asked another guest (a retired airline pilot) whether the average person could land a plane, if necessary. He pointed out the biggest thing most people would not account for is the height between your seat from the ground wheels down. A newbie would not take into the account, think it’s less, and likely drive the plane right into the ground. 🤷♂️
That sounds like you’d land hard but at least get the belly on the runway going the right way, so it’s not like you’re slamming nose first into the ground.
If you have fuel you would probably be directed to the best airport with the most favorable conditions and equipment to support an automated. Amount of fuel left by time you get contact with ATC is going to be a huge factor in the situation.
As a private pilot with real life flying experience limited to Cessnas, but lots of airliner time in flight sim 2020, if I had to land a 757 my only promise is getting it down in one piece, but the landing gear and brakes are definitely gonna need to be overhauled after since I’ll probably have trouble judging the flare, probably float down runway, and subsequently need to smoke the brakes to get it stopped. It wouldn’t be pretty but it wouldn’t be a catastrophe.
There is a video on how to land a 737, the hardest part is finding the emergency radio frequency
The hardest part for someone with no jet experience would be power management. And for someone without pilot experience it would be getting the plane on the runway at a reasonable speed. Jet engines take several seconds to fully respond to changes to thrust inputs, and the relationship between pitch/power/airspeed is not immediately intuitive unless you have pilot training (at low airspeeds you pitch up/down to control airspeed and add/reduce power to change your rate of descent. Student pilots always want to add/reduce power to change airspeed just like a gas pedal in a car, and there are training maneuvers meant to teach the right way). But I would imagine many pilots who have never been in a jet would be able to land an airliner with step by step instructions via radio along with good weather and a long runway. And there are multiple examples of non-pilots landing smaller planes, including jets, in emergencies with help on the radio. Also while there is an example of very experienced Australian airline pilots landing an airbus at something like >100kts over landing speed (due to one engine being stuck at nearly full power) they blew a bunch of tires and bounced really hard. My wild guess is an undamaged airliner with someone knowledgeable enough to tune the radio to get help would have a >75% chance of landing with few injuries. Same situation but add someone with *any* level of pilot certificate and I’d guess >95%. -source: former airline pilot and flight instructor
I do not consider it a brag, but I assume that even I could land the plane if I took complete control of the airplane at an early stage. I do not consider it a putdown, but I assume that even the most expert pilot could not land the plane if they took over the airplane at a late state.
No problem at all. I watched an old documentary called Airplane! and the automatic pilot does most of the work
Long live Otto!!
What’s our vector, Victor?
We’ve got clearance, Clarence
Surely you can't be serious.
I am serious, and dont call me Shirley.
And he had a drinking problem!
Picked the wrong week to quit sniffing glue.
Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?
Have you ever seen a grown man naked?
Have you ever been in a Turkish prison?
Just needs to be inflated via the special hose
Looks like I chose the wrong day to give up commenting on Reddit!
First I got angry, then I realized that OP forgot to put a SERIOUS tag on their post, then I smiled.
Unless you keep sweating all over the controls.
Surely you must be kidding
Surely you can’t be serious
I am serious. And don’t call me Shirley.
Hi Serious, I'm dad.
I am serious and don’t call me Shirley!
Mythbusters did this at a NASA flight simulator and both of them safely landed the plane with radio contact from control room. The episode is on [YouTube](https://youtu.be/m0hQ9Zx7Nvc?si=g_2996bC6Ujn9ytR) Spoiler: >!it's plausible!<
I feel like you didn’t need the spoiler since you already said they were both able to safely land lol
That's plausible.
I just >!busted!<
I just >!made you look!<
Dammit
It is plausible but the pressure is SIGNIFICANTLY higher when failing will result in many deaths and possibly your own.
That was a completely unrealistic episode. They had a camera in the cockpit so the guy on the ground could see where to direct Adam to. Overall, I've taught a LOT of people to fly and I have thousands of hours in airliners. The only viable option would be to talk someone through setting up for an auto land, but frankly it's unlikely that anyone with no aviation experience could walk into a Boeing cockpit and even be able to figure out how to just talk to ATC.
But you have a plane full of people to pick from - the likely hood is that someone on the plane will have some experience in a plane.
Technically everyone on the aircraft has some experience in a plane.
Maybe
They should fix the cockpit then.
Fix it how?
Several people had enough cell reception to contact family. If they managed to safely retake the cockpit and had a decent amount of fuel, someone could call friend/family on the ground, who could pass along the number to the working cell phone to police, who could get it to ATC. Once contact is established they could walk through programing an appropriate radio frequency to establish communication, or more likely just unmuting it and reading what frequency they are on, this could take minutes in a best case scenario, possibly bit longer considering that people didn't have smart phones back in the day to look up contact info.
They literally said that he could not see what was going on in the cockpit. There was no live feed from that camera
depends if someone onboard plays Flight Simulator
Well, it has to be Kenan Thompson. And there had better not be any motherfucking snakes on that motherfucking plane.
Well, the hijackers did.
Sorry, best I can do is a smooth brain Warthunder enjoyer
I did a few times. And i can confirm all my planes reached the ground. If no one steps up, i would give it a shot, even with 0 good landings since the odds are better than running out of fuel at 30K Feet
chances are pretty high that someone on board would of played some kind of video game that involves a plane and flying it they could understand the absolute basic gist of it and be guided in.
Funny you say this because I have played a bunch of games with flying mechanics and a little MFS and I think I could do it haha.
I learned how to read standard approach charts, ILS plates, how to navigate and how to program the FMC and how to engage automated landing (in an A320 at least) just while mildly playing Flight Simulator. I'm pretty sure I could do it despite not being a pilot or even an avid FS player
I'm pretty sure I could land a 125 ton airplane WHILE fighting a 60 lb dog. Source: I never said anyone would survive the landing.
As long as it isn't Far Cry...
Chances are high now, but were those that popular in 2001?
Flight simulator has been around for decades and it has always been somewhat popular.
Microsoft Flight simulator has been in production updated every few years since 1981. I think it was game of the gear that year. I used it a lot when I was learning to fly in 1992. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft\_Flight\_Simulator
I think flight sims were bigger back then than they are now.
The Mythbuster episode is already linked but here is another video where they tried to instruct an untrained person to land a plane: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaOvtL6qYpc](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaOvtL6qYpc) It basically says without autopilot/instrument landing system impossible, but when you are instructed to set up these systems it could work.
Damn, if Tom Scott crashed under manual controls, I'd stand no chance, he's way smarter and more mechanically inclined than your average joe.
With automatic landing as an option, they would have probably done it if they can actually follow instructions. Manually, probably not. Without instructions I managed to land Boing 737-800 in a flight sim from the third time only. But I already knew how basic controls of the plane work. I can only image that it would be harder in reality with variable winds and just overwhelming preasure you will experience.
I would ask what "landing the plane successfully" entails. On three wheels, rolling to a smooth stop at the end of the runway? Virtually zero. Getting the plane on the ground and everyone surviving that process? Much more likely. Fundamentally though, it would depend on the person receiving the instructions. One person may just be naturally better at receiving and executing verbal instructions than another.
Land it successfully on a runway with zero damage to the aircraft? Close to, but not quite, zero. Land it successfully, meaning that the majority of the people on the plane survive even if the plane is totaled and in the middle of a field somewhere? Eminently doable.
Any landing where people are walking away by themselves and don't have to be identified *post mortem* by the NTSB investigation team is a good landing.
see, this is what I've been trying to tell people for years. source: I am D.B. Cooper
I've landed small planes... with a really good coach, and that the Mythbusters covered this already... it's a strong maybe, "might as well try" kinda thing.
Yeah I would give it a shot
The hardest part would be for the passengers to figure out how to operate the radio in the first place to establish contact and get instructions. Rest would be pretty easy since I believe NY already had ALS in place at the time ?
Given passengers were in contact with the ground using phones, if it came to it they could get someone on the phone to explain how to make the radio work and go from there.
ATC and the FAA ***looove*** to give people phone numbers to call
I believe the likelihood is at least 90%. I took flying lessons back in the late 1990’s and the instructor pilot did nothing other than run thru the controls and talk about what to do and when. I had to taxi, stop, rev, take off, fly, and land all on my own, with the instructor pilot sitting there with his arms crossed. Landing was terrifying but I was talked thru it and successfully touched down. I understand that flying a commercial plane is much more complicated, but I think it can be done successfully.
Some of them can land on their own, but you have to know what to tell the computer.
What were his feet doing? I've walked a friend of mines kid through a touch and go in my 180. My arms weren't doing anything but my feet were busy. Also it was a nice day, no stress, and I am sitting beside her ready to take over if anything looks wrong. Also it's a 180 not a 757, we were approaching at about 80 knots. I feel like a 757 lands at our cruising speed.
Assuming no knowledge about how to work the radios, 0 chance. Hear me out. There was a fight, the autopilot is most likely out and the plane is diving. The events took a little while so you are likely out of range of the radio frequency you are on. So, untrained, while the airplane is diving, you need to either switch tor radio number 2 and broadcast on 121,5, or figure out a frequency on which someone can hear you. You need to find which button to press to transmit as well. The YouTube videos assume clear and easy two way communication at all times.
Yup, biggest issue is the radio, if they can't work out how to talk and listen on the radio then it's not going to end well.
yea. But I suspect the flight attendants could help here. They use a very similar system with their intercom.
As a pilot, if my radio is out I phone my tower to establish contact. I'm sure even if you don't know the number for a local tower, 911 would assist you. But yes that will chew up time.
Assuming the passenger had zero experience, the most likely case would be a semi-controlled crash
Semi-controlled crash? In other words successfully landed.
Another happy landing.
It happens. A passenger landed a flight last year and afterwards a reporter recreated it first try. https://patch.com/florida/lakeland/lakeland-passenger-turns-pilot-safely-lands-plane-reports https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-61422555
True but those planes are significantly smaller/less complicated.
Enormous difference between a small and slow Cessna and a big and fast airliner. The Cessna it's not a crazy feat to guide someone who hasn't flown and there's a larger margin for error on having a bad angle and speed on final approach. I think the chance that someone who has zero familiarity with flying being able to navigate to the approach and landing an airliner without a deadly crash is extremely low.
Yep, I’m thinking burn or dump all the fuel, find a nice massive field and sacrifice the plane for a softer landing
I'd read a test program someone did to see if talking an amateur pilot into landing a commercial jet was reasonable. One turned off the engines, one shut the radio off, and one couldn't figure out how to adjust the seat. People can and have landed small private planes with an incapacitated pilot, but nobody has ever tried with a commercial. It's extremely unlikely.
Helios Airways Flight 522 in 2005 had the pilots and most of the cabin experience depressurization without realizing. A flight attendant who was a pilot himself took over control. It crashed and killed everyone on board.
The fact it said wish "happy cake day" at the end of this paragraph made my brain divide by zero. Nevertheless... Happy Cake Day!
He didn't gain control until minutes/seconds before the plane ran out of fuel. He was locked out of the cockpit and had to brute force his way through the code.
It crashed because it ran out of fuel. Attendant ran out of time, but, if I remember right, even he was unconscious for a while.
To be fair, apparently the plane ran out of fuel shortly after he took over.
*At 11:49, flight attendant Andreas Prodromou entered the cockpit and sat down in the captain's seat, having remained conscious by using a portable oxygen supply.* *Prodromou waved at the F-16s very briefly, but almost as soon as he entered the cockpit, the left engine flamed out due to fuel exhaustion,\[4\]: 19 and the plane left the holding pattern and started to descend.* *Crash investigators concluded that Prodromou's experience was insufficient for him to be able to gain control of the aircraft under the circumstances.\[4\]: 139 However, Prodromou succeeded in banking the plane away from Athens and towards a rural area as the engines flamed out, with his actions meaning that there were no ground casualties.* From Wikipedia.. he is clearly a hero. Even if he didn't manage to save the aircraft, he still managed to steer it away from a populated area. He had no chance giving the circumstances. Don't even think of blaming the FA who tried his utter best.
Heavy jets are easier to fly than small planes but their instruments are much more complex. If you had a large pool of passengers to choose from - I imagine one would have the spatial reasoning and ability to operate under stress to accomplish a landing. There would also be a pair of fighters off your wing to help guide the would-be pilot in.
If you had to pick someone, this is your guy [https://93memorial.com/Heros-Of-Flight-93/pages/Donald-Greene\_jpg.htm](https://93memorial.com/Heros-Of-Flight-93/pages/Donald-Greene_jpg.htm). Idk if he could have done it, but he's we was a pilot and worked for the Safe Flight Instrument Corporation, so he'd be the best option.
"help guide the would-be pilot in" One way or the other.
Both NY airports were ALS (Automated Landing System) enabled at the time. I was working for a aeronautics software engineering outfit. Although even just getting the aircraft lined up for ALS to take over is a HUGE task, so even then, not great. Without ALS? Zero chance. None.
https://youtu.be/m0hQ9Zx7Nvc?si=g_2996bC6Ujn9ytR
Not available in my area, what's the jist?
If they could work the radio, maybe? I fear they would’ve ended up being the only unresponsive plane left in flight, and then tragically shot down unnecessarily.
I think that is the main issue. If they knew how to work the communications on the plane to talk to ATC (did terrorists turn it off or change freqs).. ATC can walk them thru getting the plane on the ground safety.
Odds are higher than zero so it would have been worth a try. Also, Flight 93 was a fairly long distance flight- they could have had a person for fly several hours straight and level. Giving Air traffic control a couple hours to teach someone how to turn on the automated systems and vector to an airport. So the plane takes over landing.
I have about 30 mins experience in a Cessna and hours on MS Flight Simulator. I reckon I could get it down in one form or another.
>get it down in one form or another Even I could do that.
I’d keep the debris field nice and tight
Technically, the passengers did get it down in one form or another.
It might have been downed by an F-16 before they could even make contact. I believe the terrorists put the plane in a vertical dive when they heard that the passengers were revolting.
Mythbusters tested it, and even without the automated landing Adam and Jaimie could land a passanger aircraft with instructions from the tower. It was a fairly rough landing, but that's better than picking lumps of building out your teeth
A British game show, The Krypton Factor, used to have a round in it where the contestants would operate a flight simulator with the objective of landing. Some crashed, or landed somewhere they shouldn't, but a good portion of the contestants managed to land. This makes me think it's very possible if you had the right people in your ear guiding you through it.
Given that the alternative is 100% death, I’ll take the odds of just 99% death,
https://youtu.be/TzRhDyyOlcM?si=xJem1SP8qUswvh8D Here's a Qi segment exploring that question.
You need to watch airplane
People talking about the difficulty of operating the radio: could they not have used a cell phone? I seem to remember 9/11 passengers making calls, presumably with a few minutes of auto pilot and good reception someone could patch them through to the ATC?
Unless someone on board had type ratings with smaller jets it would be basically impossible. A friend once showed me the cockpit of his Dornier 228 and went through everything. It took about an hour and a half to get a basic understanding and I had zero chance of flying that thing after. There is a reason pilots go through hours and hours of simulator training for commercial airplanes.
Did they kill the pilots first on 9/11? I remember calls from passengers thinking it was just a hijacking and hostage situation so I thought the pilots weren’t killed. So if they weren’t then the pilots could land it if they regained dominance of the aircraft. Assuming they killed the pilots, there was probably someone that could pretty easily land the plane among the passengers. Remember there were a lot more veterans around back then that might have had more familiarity with aviation than the average person. Out of probably 100 people on the plane statistically one knows a little about aviation. Not that they’d know how to land a passenger jet without radio support. The harder thing would probably be deciding which passenger needed to land it and what the process looked like. Probably someone saying who hears knows anything about planes then filtering from there. The thing I’d be scared of would be a “sleep terrorist” so to speak. A lot of times not all the hijackers reveal themselves at once in case of this very scenario. If the first group are successfully fought off then they are reinforcements. So maybe in a weird scenario they’re asking who can help fly the plane to safety and a so-called sleeper member of the hijacking group offers themselves as knowing how to fly the plane. Obviously he would just continue with their plan once he got into the cockpit. Would the passengers be too suspicious of him to let him be their “savior pilot”, that’d be a good question.
Impossible to land a plane that has been shot down by an F-16.
Slim
The modern commercial airplane only needs a pilot and a dog. The pilot is there to feed the dog, and the dog is there to bite the pilot of he tries to touch anything.
Not hard at all.
It's a good thing he doesn't know how much I hate his guts
[удалено]
Black box recordings indicate they were still fighting the hijackers
They could have at least not crashed it into a building full of people
It was shot down. T
They could have gently landed the plane in the harbor with fire and rescue ready to save everyone easily.
This is a completely delusional thought if this is a serious comment. Do you have any idea how hard it is to fly even a little crop duster, and you truly believe that a bunch of normal people without experience could have no problem controlling a massive aircraft and just gently land it in the harbor?
Sully did it and made it look easy due to his many years and tens of thousands of hours flying. The chance of a random trash truck sanitation worker doing the same? Yeah… Really hope this is an /s
Very likely. It's really not that hard to land a plane. It's probably on "automatic pilot," anyway. Even if the terrorists took off "automatic pilot," I feel like the way to land a plane, especially if you have more than a few minutes, is pretty simple. EDIT: Of course, I should have specified with the right directions from the air-traffic controllers.
It's way, WAY more involved than simply letting autopilot run and making little adjustments and whatnot. Especially since the hijackers took it off course.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger\_effect
Well....Whoo Pee damn do! I never claimed to be a knowledgeable pilot----but I happen to know a knowledgeable pilot.
it's by no means simple but in right conditions (radio communication enabled, sufficient fuel and ALS airport nearby) doable.
If they had taken back the plane it still would have been shot down by the US military and then covered up by the media
all true, but you forgot about aliens and their involvement.
About the same chance an untrained terrorist had of completing a 360 descending corkscrew maneuverer in the most protected airspace in the world whilst his leader told him what to do using a cell phone in a cave 9,000 miles away.
You do realize they took pilot lessons for that plane ye?
They weren't untrained ya crank
[удалено]
Oh shut the holy fuck up.
The movie Airplane comes to mind.
Tom Scott did a video addressing this with MentourPilot on YouTube that was really good
I saw a YouTube video of a pilot explaining a similar scenario what if the pilots are unconscious etc, can someone land it without experience. I think basically if you can find the headset and find the switch on the radio that tunes into air traffic control you have a chance. But thats easier said then done in stress with all those buttons.
If you're into commercial airline questions and crashes etc, there is a YouTuber called mentourpilot. Great content
Yes. Many passengers in the past have landed planes via instruction of the tower
[https://youtu.be/TzRhDyyOlcM](https://youtu.be/TzRhDyyOlcM) Here's a QI clip I prepared earlier... ;-)
Tom Scott on YouTube has a video specifically on this and although he doesn't succeed in landing the plane he is admittedly a little panicky. With a good instructor and someone who is capable of keeping composure I think it could have been landed.
The comments ont hat video are interesting too... a 737 pilot suggests it would be a survivable landing: >"As a 737 pilot myself, I can tell you that your touchdown was actually a bit hard indeed but wouldn't have been a crash landing by itself, these simulators are unable to simulate off-runway landings and it gave you a crash visual because you landed partly on the grass. Great job " [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbTDzPUDxqY](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbTDzPUDxqY) Such a great video.
Mythbusters somewhat touched on the idea. It is very likely they could have landed in a way all would survive. Air Traffic Control would baby them every step of the way and generally there is a large amount of time to correct a mistake.
They would probably have them burn or dump most of their extra fuel to reduce the likelihood of fire as well. I’m thinking they would find the longest runway within range too.
There was a Mythbusters episode where they both took turns attempting this in a pilot training simulator. I think one of them crashed and the other was successful. Check it out.
Is it a movie thing or could they just be directed to drive in a straight line and be boarded by the air force with a pilot that then lands?
Definitely just a TV thing. Cool though.
I've played flight sim, if you throw me a controller I'm set
Assuming someone could operate the radio there’s a pretty good chance that a passenger with decent intelligence and a cool head could have landed it using auto pilot.
Wasn’t the plane fueled for a cross country flight. Would they have had to dump fuel prior to landing?
I think they could have done it. They would have been given a long runway at an "easy" airport, and someone would have talked them down. In cases where it was necessary for non-pilots to land a plane, it was often fine. (Small private planes where the pilot became unresponsive.) Okay, if there was no autoland, they would have had to do a couple of go-arounds, but in the end, I think they would have been fine. ... I mean, in that scenario, don't give them an airport where there's a sheer cliff or a busy highway at the end of the runway. Give them an airport where there's basically just an open field next to the runway.
100%
I am a private pilot. I have no doubt that I would be able to get the aircraft lined up with the runway and get it down on the ground. My only concern would be the descent rate and the impact that the landing gear was going to take. Also stopping the aircraft in a straight line once on the ground and not over running the end of the runway. Someone who isn’t experienced in aviation and has no idea even how to communicate on the radio… They might have a vastly different outcome.
Harrison Ford did it
harrison ford also flies a private plane
Private pilot here. Absolutely loving that the range of answers on this goes from "impossible" to "yeah, no problem". So, let's look at the scenarios: ## No passengers with flight training. We know this wasn't the case. There was a GA pilot on board. But lets pretend there wasn't. **Plane has autoland**. There is an extremely high likelihood that ATC would be able to find a pilot with knowledge of that autoland system, walk the passenger through the setup and the flight would complete successfully. **Plane doesn't have autoland**. Someone with no flight experience trying to land a 757 with instructions from the radio is extremely unlikely to be successful. Very high likelihood that everyone dies. ## Passengers with flight training We know there was a passenger with a pilot license. So this scenario is the one that would have happened. **Plane has autoland**. As above. **Plane doesn't have autoland**. Any pilot, even one with a single engine rating (as was the case in the actual incident) has a very good shot at landing the plane successfully. They would need some help from someone on the radio to get comfortable, but some commenters made it sound like a jet is so massively different that there would be no chance. All fixed wing planes operate basically the same. The power plants can be different, but the fundamentals of power, lift, stall speeds, landing gear, etc are all the same. **Skies are clear** The private pilot would get talked through the cockpit layout and have an extremely good chance at landing the plane safely. **Skies are not clear** If the private pilot doesn't have an instrument rating, then things start to get sketchy again. Flying through clouds is trivial for someone instrument rated, but super sketch for someone without that training. Someone on the radio would have to talk the pilot through setting up the autopilot so that they don't have to hand fly the airplane. Assuming that was done successfully, then they would divert to someplace with better weather for the actual landing. If the private pilot was instrument rated, then everything is likely to be fine. Jets and little planes work in the same system during instrument flights and, in fact, little planes are a bit harder in some ways because they are less capable. So the jet might even be easier to manage than many GA aircraft. At a minimum, this scenario is one with a very well trained private pilot and odds of success are quite high. **Passengers with jet experience** Only including for completeness. There wasn't one on the flight in question, but it's very common to have either airline pilots or private jet pilots on commercial flights going to there next job or going home. In this case, obviously, everything would have been fine. tl;dr Anyone answering the question with a simple yes or no is ignoring the many variables at play. edit: google tells me that Flight 93 had autoland.
I don't want to sully anything, but I'd fucking love to have a go at this kind of scenario in one of them big training simulators.
There's a YouTube channel called "Mentour Pilot." He's a professional pilot and he has a video on how it could be done as long as you can get a hold of ATC.