Original subtitles

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen, this is your Captain.

I hope you have a good Christmas.

Captain Stefan Rasmussen

has been in love with flying all of his life.

I got my first idea of flying

when I was a young boy.

After learning to fly in the Air Force,

Rasmussen joined Scandinavian Airlines.

He seemed to like be the one who really enjoyed his job.

On December the 27th, 1991,

he's in command of a state-of-the-art DC-9.

The flight will take him to the very edge of his abilities

as his engines fail and his plane falls out of the sky.

I was in a nightmare.

Stockholm Scandinavian 751,

we are crashing into the ground now.

What caused the most baffling accident

in Sweden's history,

is nothing investigators could have imagined.

What they finally uncover

will strain Rasmussen's lifelong relationship with airplanes

to the breaking point.

I really felt that I didn't trust the aircraft.

Mayday, mayday.

It's two days after Christmas,

Stockholm Arlanda airport is a mess

of snow, slush and ice.

Passengers boarding a mid-morning

Scandinavian Airlines flight to Copenhagen

are finding the cabin very uncomfortable.

It was really warm inside the plane when we entered

because there had been like heaters on during night

and I saw it when the passengers embarked

they also wanted to take off like jackets and shoes

because it was like a sauna.

Is it possible to turn the heat down now?

34 year old Ulf Cedermark

has been with the airline for four years.

He's the first officer on today's flight.

It was a light snowfall.

Temperature was just below freezing and light winds.

We were gonna fly Stockholm to Copenhagen

and then to Warsaw, back to Copenhagen,

and down to Barcelona that day.

It would be a quite a long working day.

Stefan Rasmussen has just finished

an exterior check of the plane.

The Danish pilot is in command this morning.

And those over 12, almost 13,000 hours

I've been sitting in the aircraft.

I always felt that I put the aircraft

on back, on my, like a rucksack.

And when we are took lift and the wings

we melted together.

The plane Rasmussen is strapping

on today is a nearly new DC-9,

easily identifiable by its two rear engines.

By now everyone should know that door stays open.

Right?

Even in the days

before terrorist threats,

flying with the cockpit door open is unusual.

It's just one way Rasmussen has endeared himself

to the crews and passengers he flies with.

I always had my cabin door open

because I found out that we had the door open

and they could see that they were human being in there,

they trust you.

For me it felt good that the door was open.

It just feels like you have a connection more

than if the door is closed.

The winter weather has delayed this flight,

but Rasmussen won't compromise safety for schedule.

Where are we now with the de-icing?

The wings aren't quite done.

We've done the underside, now they're doing the top.

Thank you.

Under Captain Rasmussen's instructions,

the ground crew had already de-iced the plane once.

Now they're giving it another pass.

And it took a while but they had trouble getting rid

of the snow on the top of the wing.

And so we were slightly late for the pushback

out our runway.

For Captain Per Holmberg

this kind of delay is routine business.

He flies DC-9s for the airline.

A passenger this morning,

he is scheduled to command another flight later that day.

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,

this is your Captain.

I hope you had a good Christmas.

We're just getting our wings cleared

as we've had a bit of snow overnight.

And when that's finished, we're ready for takeoff

for some warmer weather.

I hand picked the airline's best cabin crew

to take care of you today.

We all hope you have a nice flight.

Finally Scandinavian Airlines flight 751

is cleared to proceed.

There are buildups of snow that the crew must avoid

on the way to the runway.

Would have been nice of them to clear the snow.

Oh, that would've made it too easy.

Approaching, holding point runway 08.

Roger Scandinavian 751,

you are cleared for takeoff from runway 08.

Spoilers?

Armed.

Auto brake, take off and armed.

Runway update performed, checklist completed.

Set power.

Despite the winter conditions,

the takeoff is routine.

V1, rotate.

Gear up.

Gear up selected.

When Ulf reached out for the gear,

I heard some things which was different.

Just 25 seconds into the flight,

as the plane is climbing, there is a problem.

When you hear things are different from the

anormally you get suspicious.

That was a really big roar in the aircraft,

almost like an explosion, boom.

There was another banging noise.

But I just thought, what is that?

I had never heard that before.

It's obvious the source of the noise

is the right engine.

That sounds serious.

I believe it's a compressor stall.

I took the right troll and I moved a little back,

but there it really became strange

because the engine performance increased

when I reduced the top.

It's like, if you're sitting in your car

and you're turning your wheel to the left

and the car is driving to the right, you get confused.

We're not supposed to like call into cockpit now.

And then I thought, this is an emergency,

I have to call the Captain.

But Captain Rasmussen doesn't respond

to the call.

He's too busy trying to figure out

what's going wrong with his plane.

I couldn't see anything on the instrument.

They were quite stable and they're quite normal range.

No, no problem.

But, I could hear those roaring every second.

He searches for telltale signs

of attack or structural failure.

And I looked up at the cabin pressure

because if you have a bump, or a freight door, or anything

which is ripped off, that'll give a decompression.

In the cabin pressure levels are stable.

But the crew has other concerns.

I saw the smoke and it smells burnt.

What should we do about this?

Just 3,200 feet above the ground,

the emergency escalates.

The right engine quits.

When we have flown a little over one minute,

the right engine just went down.

I had a very, very short moment thinking

that I was in a nightmare and just dreaming.

I was confused, I was really confused.

Two seconds later the left engine also quits.

The plane is now powerless.

One engine dropped, and then another engine dropped.

I thought that it wasn't true, it wasn't true.

It wasn't real.

Less than a minute and a half after takeoff

the DC-9 begins falling from the sky.

And after that, it was complete silence.

And I think that was the worst moment for me.

Just being in the air, and it's so quiet.

It was like a bird just sailing through the sky.

So then I started to get scared.

Engine relay.

As the pilots try to restart their engines.

Things get even worse.

The left engine erupts in flames.

And I saw the exhaust gas temperature was rising rapidly.

Max temperature was around 680 degrees Celsius

and I saw it go above 800.

A fire in the engine could spread

to the rest of the plane.

Should I pull?

If Cedermark pulls the fire extinguisher

in the left engine, he will never be able to restart it.

He pulls the handle to put out the fire.

From his seat, Captain Per Holmberg can see

that the crew is in trouble.

Flight 751 is now falling at a rate of 1200 feet a minute.

But air traffic controllers at the Stockholm airport

have no idea the plane is in trouble.

Islander Stockholm Scandinavian 751.

Good morning SK 751, climb to flight level 180.

We have problems with our engines please.

We need to go back to, to go back to Islander.

751 Roger turn right heading to...

Suddenly the radio goes dead.

A result of the failed engines.

Only the right engine can provide power,

but it's now spinning too slowly to generate electricity

for the instruments.

Without the engine you don't any propulsion.

So you will, the only energy you have is your height.

With time running out,

the pilots of flight 751 must find a way

to restart the right engine or else crash

into the countryside below.

Scandinavian airlines flight 751 is now falling

from the sky at 20 feet per second.

How can I help?

Captain Per Holmberg who boarded the flight

as a passenger becomes part of the flight crew.

Oh, like he came out in the cockpit

and he said is there anything I can help you with?

I don't think I even said yes.

I said, just a, start the APU.

If the auxiliary power unit can be launched,

it will bring back the radio and instruments.

So, I just handed him the emergency checklist

and started focusing on controlling the flights

to see that we were maintaining the speed

and by the attitude that we were wings level.

He managed to start the auxiliary power unit,

so, my flight instruments were supplied from that.

But for some reason

Captain Rasmussen's instruments don't come back online.

He managed to fly the plane basically by feet.

Power is also restored to the cabin,

but it's small comfort to passengers

who now know that in extreme danger.

Stockholm, air traffic control instructs the pilots

to return to the airport.

Scandinavian 751 are you able to turn right heading

Zero nine or zero radar vectoring for 0-1?

But the plane is now just 1600 feet

from the ground.

And first officer Cedermark attempts to resuscitate it,

aren't working.

Roger, we are maintaining our heading

but we're trying to restart our engine

Making a 180 degree turn back to Stockholm

could be catastrophic.

I really had the feeling that I've,

if I turned the aircraft at that time,

we would have stalled.

When you're turning back, you are losing a lot of energy.

So the most safe thing to do is actually just to go straight

and then keep your wings level.

That means that you will use less energy

of your altitude so you can maintain your speed.

You can maintain 2000 feet.

We are not able to maintain 2000 feet.

We are descending, we are at 1600 feet and descending.

Holmberg wants Rasmussen to focus his attention

on finding a landing spot.

Look straight ahead.

Look straight ahead.

He was screaming at Steff and just look straight ahead

and watch the flight path.

Prepare for on-ground emergency.

On-ground emergency.

Bend down, bend down, bend down.

So we shouted bend down I don't know how many times,

bend down, bend down, bend down.

Keep your seat belts fastened.

While passengers grace,

Rasmussen considers where to land his plane.

Look straight ahead.

And I had an idea that on the northern direction

could bring us out to the to the Baltic sea,

which was at that time frozen

and absolutely excellent runway.

But instead he finds himself

gliding powerlessly over a dense forest.

I saw that green area and I saw that little light spot

in the middle of the forest, but that really looked short.

Steer right, steer right?

Just 500 feet above the ground,

Captain Rasmussen lifts the planes nose to slow it down,

hoping to soften the crash landing

Pine trees from the top they look very soft.

I could use the trees as a, almost like a pillow.

Should I lower the landing gear?

Yes, gear down.

Bend down and hold your knees

I prepared myself for a hard impact.

Fits an emergency landing we have no engines.

I just thought this is gonna be a hard landing.

Stockholm Scandinavian 751 we're crashing

into the ground now.

I wasn't afraid until we were flying into the trees.

Then I was scared and I knew we were not gonna make it.

I didn't thought I should die, I knew I should die.

I made my pray to God.

And then a moment after and we were, in a strange world.

After we have come to a complete stop,

I feel the smell of airplane fuel.

I thought, okay, we're gonna explode.

And I look around and I see the snow

because there was a big crack in the airplane fuselage

just in front of the Aft Galley.

And you could just walk down on the ground.

Everything was quiet and I woke up.

It might only have been a split second or so.

I was afraid that my spine was broken, that I wasn't,

I wouldn't be able to walk again.

So I remember I was sitting there and I was moving my toes

and my feet just to see if I could have control over them.

I had a pain in my hand because I had broken a bone

in my hand and I was bleeding heavily from my forehead.

So I was trying to get clear of all the blood was coming

down in my eyes.

And Stefan told me that we had to get out of the aircraft.

After plowing through 125 meters

of pine forest, the pilot's fear is now

that the broken aircraft could catch fire.

Dozens of passengers escaped

through the breaks in the fuselage walls.

But Captain Per Holmberg has been knocked unconscious

by the crash.

It all went so fast that like no one could take

in like what happened.

So I tried to stay with the group passengers I had there

but I just knew the feeling also

that we had to wait a long time for the rescue teams.

Help will be here soon.

Fortunately, no fire materializes,

but because they removed their winter clothing

while boarding the sweltering plane,

many passengers are starting to freeze.

Most people were just standing in their shirts,

t-shirts very, very little clothes.

Few didn't even have shoes on.

They are now at risk from hypothermia.

So I focused on, on being caring.

Maybe I did it for my own sake also, I needed a hug also.

It was so comforting to like comfort someone else.

The wreckage of Scandinavian Airlines

flight 751 lies just 15 kilometers Northeast

of Stockholm Islander Airport.

The fuselage has broken into three pieces.

In the chaos of the moment, nobody knows

how many people have been killed in the crash.

Rescue was arrived within minutes

and attend to the freezing survivors.

They pull Captain Per Holmberg from the cabin unconscious.

He landed on the wall at impact.

And he skated down on the wall to the floor at impact.

So he was quite badly damaged.

He cut his eyelid and he also got his collarbone

that was broken off.

So his shoulder was in front of him.

92 of the passengers have sustained injuries.

Only eight are considered serious

But when the crew conducts a headcount

they're stunned to learn that out

of the 129 people who boarded flight 751,

not a single one was killed in the crash.

Everyone survived.

It was like a shock just to take in.

Wow, that was fantastic comment.

I guess I was the happiest Captain in the world.

We were all alive.

That was a great moment.

Reporters break the remarkable story

to the world, as the Swedish Accident Investigation Board

or SAIB takes charge of the case.

Scandinavian airlines alerts its own investigators

dispatching Tore Hultgren to head up its team.

It's most unusual that the plane crashes

and in a wooded area, and everybody survives.

I've never heard of it before.

The police kept everybody off the site itself.

Was the coding around the aircraft of 100 meters.

We had to complete aircraft, nothing had burned.

And we had lots of good day.

Henrik Elinder from the SAIB gets to work

on the evidence.

And we all started to plan the documentation

of the extent site, which means photographing all

the final approach through the woods,

and to take photos of all the parts

that were spread all over the place.

The two black boxes, which record cockpit conversations

and store flight data are recovered immediately.

Investigators speak to survivors.

Everyone tells a similar story.

Would you mind telling me what you saw and heard.

Loud booming sounds from the engines moments

after the fight began, smoke in the cabin

and finally the entire loss of power and an engine on fire.

You have a twin engine aircraft

and you are really not supposed to lose both engines

at the same time.

The Pratt and Whitney turbofan engines are sent

to a Scandinavian airlines repair shop

for closer examination.

Investigators are eager to speak

with Captain Rasmussen about the incident,

but to the dismay Scandinavian Airlines

takes him to the media first.

First question, what did you have to think

when board engine refuse to function?

It'll take me off for a lot of time

to tell you all that.

The normal case is that the key witnesses like the crew

and so on should be kept in quarantine

until they meet the investigation board.

European media celebrate

Captain Stefan Rasmussen as a hero

for landing the DC-9 without engine power.

But investigators consider the possibility that he

or his co-pilot had made errors that caused the crisis

in the first place.

The honor and the glory always rests with a Captain.

But so does also the mishaps.

I knew that being a person where in the spotlight

of the press would be a quite different situation.

And I said to myself, the only thing you can do now

is to give them all the story

and then pray that they will find the reason.

Laws Lindberg

is an investigative representative

for the Swedish Airlines Pilot Association.

He examines the wreckage for signs of mechanical

or structural failure.

We knew both engines had failed for some reason.

So we was concerned, what was the background for something

like that to happen?

The first time I saw the engines in the workshop,

I was surprised.

Is this all they found?

There was a number of parts that were completely missing.

And this was something we hadn't seen before to this extent.

To find out what happened,

investigators must find the missing pieces

which now lies somewhere in snow covered fields and forests.

A close study of Scandinavian Airlines flight 751 engines

reveals exactly which pieces are missing.

Parts of this aircraft was shedding parts

from both engines.

And then what you do is you go further in

and you document everything

and you try to find the root cause

and see how it all comes together.

The missing pieces could hold the key

to discovering why both of the plane's engines quit

within seconds of each other.

But they could be anywhere along the 15 kilometer route

the aircraft covered during its short flight.

They must be found.

Investigators use the flight data recorder

to map the plane's journey

and determine where engine parts may have fallen.

After scouring the snow covered fields

along the planes path,

the recovery team finds 500 fragments

just a fraction of what's missing.

Many are very badly damaged.

Some of the titanium blades actually seem to

have been on fire.

You have this titanium fire inside both engines,

both the right down the left engine.

And this titanium fire is a very unique occurrence.

It's requiring very, very high pressure

and very high temperature for a titanium blade

to catch fire.

Investigators dig deeper into the cause

of the engine trouble.

The left engines fuel line is badly dented.

It was obviously hit by a fast moving piece

of metal inside the engine.

The impact caused it to rupture.

This part, got dislodged, it went out and hit a fuel line.

And that fuel line cracked sprayed fuel onto the hot engine.

The engine was clearly coming apart during the flight.

That sounds serious.

The discovery explains the fire in the left engine.

And why so many pieces of it were found so far

from the crash site.

But investigators are left wondering why the engines

broke up in the first place.

A major clue comes from passenger and crew testimonies

which told of repeated booming noises

before the left engine caught fire.

The cockpit voice recorder picked up these sounds

If you can hear that then we could correlate that

with when the damage occurred

you can see that on the flight data recorder.

The sounds are familiar to investigators

and leave no doubt.

The DC-9s engines began surging shortly after take-off.

Jet engines rely on a steady stream of air for combustion.

A series of fans move incoming air

through various stages of compression.

But when that flow is disrupted, fuel at the rear

of the engines ignites violently and shoots forward.

That's a surge.

You can have a small surge and you can have a large surge.

You can have the complete surge on the whole end.

That sound serious.

This surge process was very violent.

So, after a very short time, we had an aircraft

with two engines that could not be restarted,

that didn't generate any thrust.

Basically you had a giant glider at that point.

A closer look at the fan blades from the front

of the engines explains why they were surging.

They're badly dented.

The damage would have prevented them

from effectively directing air to the rear of the engines.

This damage that twisted the fan blade

started this process.

You've got this disturbed error in the fan.

You've got this rotating fan stall that

then triggered this whole breakdown that compress the surge.

And then the whole process that led up

to the dual engine failures.

But what exactly mangled the blades?

There are ways to tell.

Yeah, if it comes from a stone or rubber, ice

and so on, you can see it on the shape of the damage.

The ice causes very specific damages.

It's sort of like a soft dent.

Analysis of dent patterns on the fan blades

is conclusive, they were struck by ice.

Now investigators want to find out

where the ice could have come from.

Weather data for the 24 hours leading up to the crash.

They know Stockholm had been hit with rain

and snow in the hours before flight 751 took off.

It was a situation where the temperature around 30 degrees

it was a drizzle snow rain in the morning.

They learned that the DC-9 arrived

from Zurich the night before,

with the fuel tanks more than half full.

They had quite a large amount of reserve fuel,

or diversion fuel in their wings.

The fuel in the wing tanks, very close

to minus 20 degrees celsius.

The conditions that night were ideal

for the formation of clear ice on the wing surface.

And here you had very, very cold fuel

on the top wing skin.

And as the temperature dropped during the night,

it went to snow and rain and finally snow.

So there was a layer cake.

Ice at the bottom, flush and snow on top.

But 10 inches, top of the wings in the morning.

Responsibility for de-icing the plane

ultimately falls on the Captain.

Rasmussen insists he was aware of the overnight buildup.

Investigators wonder if the pilot did all he could

to ensure his plane was completely free of ice.

Rasmussen claims he instructed technicians

to de-ice the plane thoroughly.

I did a walk around with, at the aircraft.

It was cold, it was a frosty.

Noticing that there was still frost

on the wings the head technician ordered

a second round of de-icing.

I was really convinced that the aircraft was clean.

And so was he, so was he.

Where are we now with the de-icing.

The wings aren't quite done,

they've done the underside.

The cockpit voice recorder

backs up Rasmussen's testimony.

They've got it good and clean under the wings?

Yes, yeah.

They de-iced aircraft once and looked again and said

once more and the de-iced at the second time.

In fact, a total of 850 liters of fluid

was sprayed on the aircraft.

But the fluid may have been faulty, not potent enough

to melt the thick layer of ice that had accumulated

on the wings overnight.

Technicians test samples of the fluid used

to de-ice flight 751.

They found no discrepancies.

There was nothing wrong with any of the fluids used.

But when investigators interview

the maintenance crew that worked on the plane,

they begin wondering if the dicing team was thorough enough

in their efforts.

The ground crew insists that after they sprayed the wing

it appeared to be clean, but that appearance was deceptive.

It looked perfect because the clear ice

on top of the fuel tanks, you cannot see the clear ice.

A technician inspected the front of the wing

and found no ice.

He couldn't have known that there was ice further back

out of his reach.

No provisions for stairs or anything that he could use

to get up on the wing at the de-icing platform.

It look shiny and nice, could see any ice on it

but still there was maybe an inch of ice on top of the wing

when the aircraft took off.

As soon as the plane took flight,

the ice became a problem.

On this aircraft the engines are positioned

behind the wings.

And as the aircraft rotated and the wings bend

in order to take the weight of the aircraft,

this ice in the wing roots loosened

and it sucked right into the engine.

The ice damage, the fan blades

of the front of the engines and ultimately caused them

to begin surging.

Nobody really expected that this would happen

or could happen, but it did.

When ice breaks off the wings during flight,

it doesn't pose a problem for most aircraft,

but the placement

of a DC-9s engines leaves the more susceptible

to being struck.

The Pratt and Whitney engines on flight 751 were designed

to withstand this type of ice ingestion.

Something else must explain the disaster.

Investigators know that the wrong reaction

by a pilot can make surges worse.

They go through the flight data to see what

these pilots did when the emergency struck.

The first thing you do when you have a surge,

if you recognize that the surge is that you reduce power.

Captain Rasmussen claims he did just that.

Of course you just pulled the throttle back

and then you have to, the balance

between the incoming fuel and incoming air.

And now that was actually what I did.

But the flight data recorder

tells a different story.

Why is the engine power increasing?

It clearly shows that in the moments

after the surge thrust was reduced,

but then seconds later it was increased

to beyond full power.

Yeah, it didn't add up because the RPM was increasing

to 110% in the throttle position was moving.

It shouldn't be.

The only thing that could move the throttles

at then was pilots hand.

But if Rasmussen didn't push

the throttles forward, something else did.

It would explain the Captain's confusion

as his engines began to surge.

As a pilot when you gone through the training

you'd done all your emergency training.

You've been through the simulator and now you have a system

that is doing something that you don't expect.

It's very confusing.

Despite their relentless efforts,

investigators can find no possible explanation

for the increase in thrust.

The frustrating part with the investigation was

that we could not figure out why the system did what it did.

Then almost two months after the accident

the planes manufacturer provides the answer.

The culprit is something called

Automatic Thrust Restoration.

It's brand new.

It automatically increases the thrust during the climb.

Swedish authorities learned

that Automatic Thrust Restoration or ATR

was recently introduced as a safety feature

on Scandinavian Airlines planes.

It existed because the FAA had discovered some pilots

were throttling back considerably while taking off

and landing to reduce noise over residential neighborhoods.

The ATR was designed to make it impossible for them

to throttle back to dangerous levels.

So as soon as he power back, the system kicked in.

Investigators learned that

when Rasmussen reduced power to clear his engine surge,

the system read this as a dangerously low power setting

and push the throttles forward.

The increased thrust made the surging worse

until the engines destroyed themselves.

The investigation concludes that the pilots

had taken the right steps to clear the surge

and prevent the catastrophe.

But the computer code which governs

the ATR undermined their efforts.

The strip of serious and once caused the throttles

to move and caused the engines that were stalling

because he already got too much fuel or even more fuel.

And it went into self-destruct both the engines,

only in a few seconds, they're both totally destroyed.

The system was so new to Scandinavian Airlines

that nobody there had even heard of it.

And it was confusing for everyone

because we didn't know about the system.

We didn't have information on the system.

SAS didn't know the system existed on their aircraft

We hadn't bought that modification.

And it was sneaked in via another system.

Because he didn't know about the ATR,

Rasmussen was unaware that he could only save his plane

by switching it off.

News that the Automatic Thrust Restoration was responsible

for the accident proved both a blessing

and a curse for Captain Rasmussen.

It eliminated any notion that he had made a mistake.

When I got that measures, I was really released.

It was like winning in the lottery.

It was a, because I was so happy

because then I could explain why I was

in that total kind of confusion.

But the fallout would ultimately

destroy a love affair and end a career.

On October the 20th, 1993,

the Swedish Accident Investigation Board releases its report

on the crash of flight 751.

It determines that the actions of Captain Rasmussen

and first officer Cedermark contributed

to the safe outcome of this incident.

And although investigators question

Captain Per Holmberg decision to enter the cockpit

in the first place, they do praise his contribution.

This group flew until they stood still on the ground.

They never gave up, they never gave up.

They didn't give an inch.

The investigators put much of the blame

for the accident on Scandinavian Airlines.

Because their procedures for checking

for clear ice were inadequate.

I believe it's a compressor stall.

The report also condemns the fact

that the pilots didn't know

about the Automatic Thrust Restoration

and how it would act in a surge situation.

If the ATR system hadn't been there

if the throttles hadn't moved forward,

there wouldn't have been an accident.

It was a bit strange

that we didn't have all the documentation available to us.

So we knew what we could expect if something,

it wouldn't, like this would happened

In the wake of the crash,

Scandinavian Airlines started training its pilots

how to use the ATR system.

They also implemented steps to ensure airplanes

don't take off with clear ice on the wings.

We changed all the procedures, we provided stairs

for the mechanics, and we made it a requirement

to go up on top of the wing and touch it with your hand

to verify after de-icing.

After healing from his injuries,

first, officer Ulf Cedermark returned to the cockpit.

I didn't feel the responsibility

that I wouldn't be able to do my job again.

Whatever happens, I know that I still can see things

for what they are.

And I still love doing my job.

And if something bad happens so I can deal with it.

But Stefan Rasmussen's return proved far more difficult.

Set power.

After I'd head from a high skilled psychologist,

we talked about getting in the air again.

He knew that would be a hard decision to take.

Gear up.

After time in the simulator, Rasmussen

couldn't regain confidence in his plane.

Sorry, guys.

In a disaster this situation, in a crisis

is that you have optimized the teamwork

between man and machine.

I really felt that I didn't trust the aircraft.

Pilots tends to take the responsibility

before all that went wrong.

Too much of the glory,

and also too much of the responsibility.

With the right counseling, about 90%

of pilots involved in an accident are able

to continue flying.

Even though Captain Rasmussen received treatment,

his career ended with the crash of flight 751.

Taking that decision to leave aviation as pilot,

was like having you, your highest love

and come to that conclusion that you have to kill her.

I had many hours, many missions of happiness in an aircraft.

And I loved my passengers, I loved my aircraft so much.

So I said, that's it.

I never regret it, never.

And I think I was right.