All language subtitles for Air.Disasters.S04E13.Vanished.1080p.PMTP.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-maldini_track3_[eng]

Narrator: Two and a half miles
below the waves...

Man: The biggest challenge
was the depth.

Narrator: ...at the bottom
of the Atlantic,

investigators search
for the wreckage

of Air France flight 447.

Man: This was a major
commercial airline...

Man: What the hell
are you doing?

Man: ...that had a plane
suddenly drop out of the sky

in 4 1/2 minutes.

Narrator:
228 people are gone.

Man: It was a real shock.

Man: We need to contact

Brazil and Senegal air traffic
control right away, please.

Narrator:
Air crash investigators
face a monumental task.

Man: We absolutely
had to understand

why this accident happened.

Man: The easiest explanation

is that a bomb
blew it out of the sky.

That would explain it.

Narrator: The answers
may lie in the wreckage,

but finding that evidence...

Man: Stop. Stop there.

Narrator:
...will take years.

Man: They had to do
whatever it took.

Flight Attendant:
Ladies and gentlemen,
we are starting our approach.

Pilot: We lost both engines!

Flight Attendant:
Put the mask over your nose.

Emergency descent.

Pilot: Mayday, mayday.

Flight Attendant:
Brace for impact!

Controller: I think I lost one.

Man: Investigation starting...

Man: He's gonna crash!

Narrator: May 31, 2009.

Air France flight 447
is crossing the Atlantic.

The Airbus A330
is flying overnight

from Rio de Janeiro to Paris.

58-year-old Captain Marc Dubois
is in command.

First Officer:
Here's the new forecast.

Narrator: He's been a pilot
for well over half his life

and is now one of the most
senior captains at Air France.

Marc Dubois: It's hard to see
anything in this plane

with this lighting.

Narrator: First Officer
Pierre-Cedric Bonin

is 32 years old.

He's been flying the A330
for about a year.

Pierre-Cedric Bonin:
We are arriving at Intol.

Narrator: 37-year-old
relief Pilot David Robert

is on standby.

Narrator: The three pilots
fly in shifts to stay alert.

There are 216 passengers
on the 11-hour flight,

including Canadian
business executive Brad Clemes.

John Clemes: I talked to my
brother on the Sunday morning,

and we talked
about our children,

and then I talked to him

right up to the time
that he got onto the plane.

Like so many
of these air warriors

or whatever they call them,

he flew all the time,
he was quite used to it,

and I think
he probably even enjoyed it.

Narrator: Autopilot
holds the plane steady

at 35,000 feet.

Controller:
Air France 447.

Dubois: Air France 447,
go ahead.

Narrator:
And the crew communicates with
Brazilian air traffic control.

Controller: Air France 447,
contact the Atlantic center.

Narrator: As they fly,
an onboard computer

monitors the engines,
hydraulics, and other systems.

It also sends progress reports
to Air France headquarters.

Every 10 minutes,

the computer transmits
the plane's position,

along with any maintenance data.

Man, translated: The goal
of the maintenance messages

is simply to help
the ground teams

prepare for any repairs
to the plane

that are needed
for the next departure.

Dubois: Atlantico, Atlantico.

Air France 447
calling Atlantico.

Controller:
Air France 447, Atlantico.

Go ahead.

Narrator: Three hours
into the flight,

the captain reports reaching
a navigational waypoint

off the coast of .

Dubois: Air France 447,
position Intol.

Controller:
Maintain flight level 350.

Dubois: Ok. Will do.

Bonin: So we've...
Got a thing up ahead.

Dubois: Yes, I saw that.

Narrator: At 1:49 a.m.,

the A330 leaves
Brazilian radar surveillance

and enters a communications
dead zone over the mid-Atlantic.

Two hours later,

an air traffic controller
in Senegal

tries to contact the flight.

Controller:
Air France 447, this is Dakar.

Do you copy?

Come in, Air France 447.

Narrator:
He can't reach the crew,

so he alerts Air France.

Controller:
Dakar for Air France.

Have you heard
from AF447? Over.

Man: Negative.

Hold for Air France, please.

Narrator: No one has heard
from the crew of flight 447.

The only communication:

24 maintenance messages
transmitted by the plane

hours earlier.

An Air France
maintenance worker

tries to make contact,

but his message
bounces back.

Man: What the hell?

Narrator: Perhaps the
communication system has failed.

David Learmount: HF Radio,
especially at night,HF

is not terribly reliable.

So for some of the time
that it was missing,

everybody was saying,

"well, I hope it's just
a communication problem."

Narrator:
By the time the plane

should have reached
Frecnh airspace,

controllers still
can't make contact.

At Charles de Gaulle Airport
in Paris,

the 11:10 a.m. Arrival time
comes and goes

with no sign of flight 447.

The A330 would have
run out of fuel by now.

The airline begins
notifying families.

The plane has almost certainly
crashed at sea.

John Clemes: I had
an infinitesimally small hope

that he might have been
on a different plane

because we weren't 100% sure

what other flights
might be coming back

that he could
possibly be on.

Narrator: By the afternoon
of June 1st,

the world learns that flight 447
from Rio to Paris

has mysteriously vanished.

Learmount: It was a real shock,
to me and the whole industry,

that...that a modern aircraft
like an Airbus A330,

operated by a world-class
airline like Air France,

could just go missing,

without a word.

Narrator: Searchers scramble
to the mid-Atlantic

to search for the plane
and survivors.

Clemes:
The plane had been missing
11 or 12 hours at this stage,

without any communication
whatsoever.

Narrator: It's one
of the worst accidents

in the history
of commercial aviation.

An advanced passenger jet
is gone.

228 people are presumed dead.

Narrator: French President
Nicolas Sarkozy announces

there's almost no chance
anyone survived.

The job of solving
this mystery

falls to the BEA,

France's air safety agency.

It's under enormous pressure
to come up with answers.

Jean-Paul Troadec, translated:
We absolutely had to understand

why this accident happened,

and with that plane
and that airline.

Narrator: Alain Bouillard takes
charge of the investigation.

He's a pilot
and aeronautical engineer

with almost 20 years experience
as an air crash investigator.

Alain Bouillard, translated:
I had worked

on other
important investigations,

like the Concorde,

so I was conscious of the fact

that the investigation
would be difficult.

But I was calm,

and I surrounded myself
with competent people.

Narrator: French systems
Engineer Leopold Sartorius

also joins the team on day one.

Leopold Sartorius, translated:
From the beginning,

we expected a long and
complicated investigation.

Bouillard: Ok, we need to
contact and Senegal

air traffic control
right away, please.

Narrator: Their first goal:

Find what's left of flight 447.

Troadec:
It disappeared from radar

without sending
a distress signal,

and for many days,

there was no trace
on the surface of the ocean.

Sartorius: This is the last time
they sent their position.

Sartorius: Positional messages

sent by the plane
every 10 minutes

allowed us to be
sure enough of the zone--

a large zone where the plane
might be found.

Narrator: Sartorius doesn't know
what direction the plane flew

after its last
maintenance report.

He only knows
how fast it was flying.

There's a huge area to search.

Sartorius:
I say we start here.

Narrator: Thousands
of square miles of open water.

Air and naval forces
scan the ocean,

looking for any sign
of flight 447.

Finally, after five days
of searching,

a Brazilian pilot

spots a few scattered pieces
of floating debris--

wreckage from an A330.

But no survivors.

The find erases any lingering
doubts about the crash.

Everyone on board has perished.

Clemes:
Your world collapses.

It was absolutely horrible.

You know,
he was a wonderful person,

I was very close to him,

and it's just, you know,

the most horrible thing
that you could think of.

Narrator:
The families of 227 others

are in the same position,

and they all want answers.

Bouillard:
What brings an Airbus down

from 35,000 feet?

Sartorius: Nothing.

Narrator: French investigators
face an extraordinary challenge.

Bouillard: We're more used
to events taking place

during takeoff or landing,

so this event
raised a lot of questions.

Narrator: The crash
of Air France flight 447

is so bizarre,

they wonder if terrorism
is to blame.

Learmount:
I think a terrorism scenario

was thoroughly plausible,

you know,
very simply because

this is a very modern airplane
with a very good safety record.

The easiest explanation

is that something, that a bomb
blew it out of the sky.

That would explain it.

Narrator: Atlantic currents have
spread floating aircraft debris

over nearly
200 square miles of ocean.

Every piece recovered

is carefully catalogued,
photographed,

and sent ashore for analysis.

But it's the lost wreckage
that investigators need most.

It contains
the two flight recorders,

or black boxes.

Bouillard: If we didn't find
the flight recorders,

we would never understand
what happened.

Narrator: The flight recorders
capture important details.

Controller: Air France 447.

Dubois: Air France 447...

Narrator: ...of what the pilots
say and do during the flight.

Controller: Air France 447,
contact the Atlantic center.

Narrator:
The black boxes are so vital,

they're equipped
with a locator beacon

to help investigators find them,

even underwater.

But the clock is ticking.

The beacon can only
send a signal for 30 days.

What's worse--

parts of the mid-Atlantic ocean
are nearly 3 miles deep.

That's deeper than
the wreckage of the titanic.

Technicians
listen for the signal.

Investigator: At this depth,
we need to get right over them.

Narrator: But their search area
spans 6,500 square miles.

Troadec:
It was an immense area.

Bouillard: It was
a real race against time.

We only had 30 days.

Narrator:
While some investigators
scour the ocean,

others scrutinize the only
hard evidence they have:

The maintenance reports.

Man: I will pull up all
of the messages they sent.

Narrator: Flight 447
sent 24 maintenance messages

through ACARS,

the aircraft communication
addressing and reporting system.

Learmount: This is
the first serious accident

to a modern airliner

where we'd had
some ACARS data.

Narrator: ACARS messages
are highly technical.

They're not designed to reveal

what the crew saw, said,
or did during the flight.

Sartorius: To have
only the maintenance messages

to work with
is really unusual.

We had parcels of information

that gave us, in fact,
very little information.

Narrator: But they do provide
an intriguing lead.

Man: See, this is the problem
with the pitot tubes.

Narrator: One of
the maintenance messages

notes a failure
in what's called a pitot tube--

a device that measures airspeed.

Sartorius: The ACARS messages

had given us
the first piece of the puzzle.

We knew that there had been
a clogging problem

in the pitot tubes.

Narrator: Pitot tubes
are small cylindrical sensors

that sit outside
the body of the plane.

As air rushes through the tubes,
they calculate airspeed.

But sometimes pitot tubes
temporarily fail.

Sartorius: In an environment
with very dense ice crystals,

all the ice crystals
clog the tube

and stop the air
from entering.

Narrator: Air France
and other airlines

were in the process
of replacing pitot tubes

to prevent
just this kind of problem.

Bouillard: The tubes were
freezing all the time.

Sartorius: Annoying,
but certainly not dangerous.

Narrator: A frozen pitot tube

is considered
far from catastrophic.

Learmount:
If you lose a pitot tube,

you don't
fall out of the sky.

Narrator: Air France
knew about the issue

and responded to it.

Bouillard: The company
had notified its pilots

with an OSV,
an information bulletin,

that described the phenomenon

and the appropriate
measures to take.

Bouillard:
Here, look at this.

Narrator: Bouillard concludes
that frozen pitot tubes alone

cannot explain the crash.

There's more to this story.

Sartorius:
These messages aren't much help.

Bouillard: We were
certain of this right away.

We would have to
look elsewhere.

Narrator:
Bouillard wants to examine

another possible factor
in the crash:

Extreme weather.

Bouillard: Strong turbulence
can damage a plane

or even cause
the loss of an aircraft

by rupturing a wing
or damaging the onboard systems.

Narrator: Investigators
consider the possibility

that flight 447
flew through weather

violent enough
to bring down the plane.

Bouillard:
Turbulence might explain

what caused the accident.

Bonin: Altitude, Sir,
we're now at 33,000 feet.

Dubois: Maximum thrust.

Narrator:
It may have been impossible

for the pilots
to recover from a stall

brought on by a severe storm.

The forces could have
torn the plane apart.

Sartorius: On a plane,

the main danger from turbulence
is structural breakage,

like losing a piece of the tail

or losing a wing
in an extreme case.

And that would lead
to the loss of the aircraft.

Bouillard: I need
more weather data--

pilot reports,
satellite images, everything.

Narrator: Flight 447
disappeared in a volatile region

where trade winds from
the two hemispheres converge,

creating violent storms.

Bouillard: They were in the
inter-tropical convergence zone,

which often has
very strong turbulence.

Narrator: Other planes
changed their route that night

to avoid storms in the area.

Investigators aren't sure what
kind of weather flight 447 hit.

Bouillard:
What were the actual conditions?

What was the actual environment
around this plane?

It was a real question.

Narrator: Thunderstorms
can pose other threats as well,

including lightning.

Bonin: Sir, we're losing
all our instruments.

Sartorius: If there had been
some deficiency

in the insulation of the plane

and the systems were damaged,

we likely would have seen
a lot of problems.

Narrator:
Investigators pore over
the existing data and debris,

trying to determine if the plane
was damaged in the air.

They note some life jackets
were never used.

Bouillard:
Recovering the life jackets
in their original packaging

told us that the event
happened very quickly.

The passengers
weren't ready for the impact

with the surface
of the water.

Narrator: The discovery supports
an unexpected event,

like massive turbulence.

But the debris doesn't.

Bouillard:
The recovery of the tail

was a very important element.

Narrator:
The pattern of fragmentation
might reveal important clues

about when the tail broke off.

Bouillard: All the ruptures
were static in nature.

There was no trace
of fatigue damage.

Bouillard: This had to happen
when it hit the water.

Bouillard: The tail
was connected to the fuselage

at the moment of impact.

It didn't come apart in flight.

Narrator: Investigators conclude

the plane hit the water
in one piece,

ruling out a bomb,
turbulence, or lightning

as the main cause.

They will have
to keep searching.

It's been three weeks

since Air France flight 447
crashed into the Atlantic ocean.

Soon, the black box locator
beacons will go dead.

Specialists focus
on what they do have,

including part
of the plane's galley.

Bouillard: It looks like
the pressure was vertical,

like this.

Narrator:
They make a key discovery.

The plane landed flat
and at high speed.

Bouillard:
Examining the galley confirmed

that there was an enormous
vertical acceleration

the instant the plane
hit the surface of the water.

Narrator: Everything inside
the plane was flattened,

like a car
in a metal crusher.

Learmount: They realized

that the airplane had not
nose-dived into the sea.

It was almost certain that it
had belly-flopped into the sea.

And how that could have happened
to a modern airliner

nobody could think of.

Bouillard:
Under these circumstances,

it was essential
to find the recorders

to understand the accident
and explain why it happened.

Narrator: The search at sea
hits day 30

with no trace
of the black boxes.

The locator beacon
is presumed dead.

Bouillard turns
to high-tech sonar.

Bouillard:
From that moment on,

sonar was the only way we could
detect metal on the ocean floor

and have some chance
of finding the wreckage.

Narrator: But steep underwater
mountains and valleys

make the ocean floor
difficult to scan.

Paul Nelson: The search area
really hadn't been seen before.

It was the size of Switzerland,

and you were running up
through the alps,

trying to find this thing,

so that's what the terrain
looked like basically,

in a general sense.

Man: Out to here.

Narrator:
After months of searching,

they've scanned
8,500 square miles of ocean bed

and found absolutely nothing.

Bouillard: The absence of the
flight recorders and wreckage

felt very frustrating,

and like a failure.

Clemes: To us it was
inconceivable

that in 2009, 2010,

that we could lose
a major airliner

and not be able to find it,

not be able to understand even
remotely what had happened

and why 228 people
had lost their lives.

Narrator: Investigators
remain determined.

They start using autonomous
underwater vehicles, or AUVS,

used to locate the Titanic.

Nelson: It's probably
the first time

AUVS have been run
on that terrain that steep

to look
for something this small.

It's a big plane
when you stand next to it,

but when you're
searching the ocean,

it's a very small target.

Narrator:
Still, no sign of any wreckage

at the bottom of the sea.

Bouillard and his team

have been searching
over a period of 18 months.

And the chances of success
are growing increasingly slim.

Troadec: At the end of 2010,

we'd already spent
22 million euros.

Narrator: Continuing the search
will cost millions more,

with no guarantee of success.

Troadec: We weren't sure
we could find the wreckage.

And if we did find
the recorders,

we weren't sure
we'd be able to read them.

The black box is not designed

to stay in such deep water
for two years

and still function afterwards.

Narrator: The boxes may have
already been crushed

by the tremendous
underwater pressure.

Two and a half miles
below the surface,

they're up against
a punishing force

of over 5,800 pounds
per square inch.

Despite the odds,
Bouillard doesn't give up.

He knows victims' families and
many in the aviation community

are desperate for answers.

Bouillard: We can't stop.

We can find the boxes.
I know we can.

Learmount: For the BEA,

it was their job
to find out what happened,

so obviously they wanted
to find the black boxes.

But can you imagine
what it would be like for Airbus

not to know for sure
what caused this accident?

Only ever to be able
to theorize about it?

Narrator: Families continue
to apply pressure, as well.

Clemes: It was extremely
important for us

that they find the black boxes
and find out what happened.

And we were determined

to put as much pressure
as we could on the authorities

to ensure
that the search continue.

Narrator: On March 25, 2011,

the BEA begins
one final search.

Again, they launch AUVS
to scour the ocean floor.

They focus
on a 23-mile-wide circle

around the plane's
last-known position.

Nelson: The AUV
is separate from the vessel.

So once you launch it,

it runs
its 20- or 24-hour mission

independent of the vessel.

If the weather gets rough,

the AUV is still
tracking back and forth,

and it doesn't care.

Narrator:
One week into the search,

an AUV captures a sonar image

of something huge
on the ocean floor.

Nelson:
It sure looks like a plane.

Narrator: The crew immediately
sends down another AUV--

this time to take
high-resolution digital images.

Nelson: I never thought
I'd see the day!

Narrator:
The crew sends the images

straight to Bouillard's office
in Paris.

Bouillard:
I don't believe it.

Thank god.

Bouillard:
Receiving the photographs

was a moment we had waited for
for two years.

It conjured up
indescribable emotions--

very strong.

Narrator: On April 3, 2011,

the wreckage of Air France
flight 447

has finally been found.

It lies 7.5 miles northeast

of the plane's
last reported position,

at a depth
of more than 13,000 feet.

Bouillard: Locating the wreckage

was already
something exceptional

and very significant
for the life of an investigator.

Investigator:
We are at 4,000 meters.

Narrator:
With the crash site pinpointed,

a second hunt begins.

An operator guides a robotic AUV
through the darkness

in search
of the two black boxes.

Nelson:
It's just like a junkyard.

It's just nothing
but aircraft debris everywhere.

Things are on top of each other,

there's fuselage skin,

there's engines...

There's all sorts of things
all over the place.

Narrator: Days pass
with no sign of the recorders.

Investigators know

that even if they find
what they're looking for,

two years underwater may have
rendered the devices useless.

Learmount: We had no idea

whether the flight data recorder
and cockpit voice recorder

would be in a working order.

Narrator:
Then, a breakthrough.

Bouillard:
Stop. Stop there.

Zoom in on that.

Incredible.

Absolutely incredible.

Bouillard: Those are moments
that are difficult to describe,

moments in your career
that you can't forget.

Narrator: An unmanned sub

recovers
the flight data recorder

and the cockpit voice recorder.

Nelson: Once it's on deck,
the gendarmerie take it,

and they put it in the box
and secure it,

then everybody's
like holding their breath.

And at that point,
you know you have it.

So it's really
a tremendous feeling.

Narrator: In Paris,

Frecnh Police escort
the flight data recorder

and the cockpit voice recorder
to Leo Sartorius' lab.

After nearly two years
of searching and theorizing,

the world may finally understand

what happened
onboard flight 447.

The answer to what went wrong

may be locked in these
watertight containers.

Bouillard:
There was a lot of concern
that we might take a false step

that would lead to the loss
of the information.

Narrator: They must be
handled with great care.

One wrong move,

and a two-year search
costing over $42 million

will have been for nothing.

Starting with
the cockpit voice recorder,

they carefully open
the protective casing,

looking for
the memory card inside.

Sartorius:
The worst thing would have been

for the actual memory cards
to be broken,

physically broken.

This isn't good.

See the damage?

Bouillard:
The transmitters look broken.

Sartorius: We quickly noticed

that there were small parts
that were broken,

so we weren't sure

that everything
was in working order.

Narrator: If technicians can't
fix the cockpit voice recorder,

or CVR,

they may never know
what happened in the cockpit,

or even who was
flying the plane.

Sartorius:
Look at the FDR card.

Narrator: A close examination
of the second box,

the flight data recorder,
or FDR,

brings better news.

Sartorius: It's fine.

No problems.

Sartorius: I think we all
looked at each other and said,

"it's incredible
that they're in this state.

It's incredible."

The memory card
was in excellent condition.

We were able to read the data
very quickly.

Narrator:
While technicians try to repair

the cockpit voice recorder,

Sartorius carefully
plots the data from the FDR.

Sartorius: They were cruising
safely at 35,000 feet.

Narrator: The FDR data reveals

that the pitot tubes
did in fact freeze.

Sartorius:
The pitot tubes freeze here.

Narrator: The frozen tubes

produce erratic
air speed readings,

causing the autopilot
to shut off automatically.

Sartorius: Autopilot shuts off,

and the pilot
takes control of the plane.

Learmount: It warns
the pilots very loudly.

That can be a bit of a surprise,
a bit of a shock,

and it definitely was a shock
to these pilots.

And it was their reaction
to this warning

which was the key to
everything else that followed.

Narrator: All crews are taught

that a frozen pitot tube
should clear itself

in less than a minute.

Learmount:
The pitots on the aircraft,

they were only subject
to the clogging

for about 56 seconds.

And after that,

the airspeed readings
were back to normal again.

Narrator: The pilot only needs
to hold the plane steady,

and the problem will disappear.

Learmount:
The airplane doesn't know

that you don't know
the airspeed.

All the airplane wants is power
to keep it going forward

and the same attitude
to keep it in level flight.

Sartorius:
But he does not hold steady.

Narrator:
Whoever was flying the plane

pulled back and pitched
the nose up instead.

Bouillard:
When the autopilot disconnected,

the pilot in command changed
the pitch of the plane.

Sartorius:
He climbs more than 2,500 feet.

Learmount: If you pull
the nose of an airplane up,

if it's going uphill,
it's gonna slow down.

Sartorius:
Here their speed dropped

more than 90 knots
in less than a minute.

This triggered
a stall warning here.

Bouillard: Raising the nose
of the plane at high altitude

put the plane into a stall
very quickly.

Narrator:
In an aerodynamic stall,

the wings lose lift and
the plane drops from the sky.

Bouillard: It was the pilot's
actions that led to the stall.

Sartorius: They fell at more
than 12,000 feet per minute.

Narrator: Inexplicably,

the pilot continued to pull back

when he should have been
pitching the plane's nose down

to gain speed and lift.

Learmount:
The more you raise the nose,

the more the lift
will be destroyed.

And that's what was happening
to Air France 447.

Sartorius: We had a plane

that was practically
falling like a rock.

Narrator:
Only the cockpit voice recorder

can reveal why the pilots
acted as they did.

Troadec: In our laboratory,
there were a few hours of agony

because we weren't sure
we could read the data

after all this effort,
all this money spent.

Bouillard: Will it play?

Sartorius: I don't know.

Narrator: Investigators
are up against the wall.

They have
just one hope remaining

in their long quest to know

what caused the worst disaster
in Air France's history.

Everything they've worked for

now depends on repairs made to
one small electronic device.

Bouillard:
The moment of truth.

Controller:
Air France 447.

Dubois:
Air France 447. Go ahead.

Controller: Air France 447,
contact the Atlantic Center.

Dubois:
Atlantico. Atlantico.

Narrator: The recording reveals

that 40 minutes
before the accident,

Captain Dubois
is in the pilot seat.

Controller:
Atlantico, go ahead.

Dubois: Air France 447,
position Intol.

Sartorius: The CVR
allowed us to understand

who was piloting the plane,

who was monitoring
the parameters.

Controller:
Maintain flight level 350.

Dubois: Ok. Will do.

Narrator: First Officer
Pierre-Cedric Bonin

is in the right-hand seat.

Bonin: So, we've got
a thing up ahead.

Dubois: Yes, I saw that.

Narrator: And the two men
are heading towards a storm.

Bonin: Looks like
we're entering the cloud.

Narrator: Normally the crew
would try to fly above a storm,

but at this stage
in the Trans-Atlantic flight,

it's not safe to do that.

Bonin: It would be good
if we can climb now, eh?

Dubois: Yeah.

Narrator: At 35,000 feet,

the air outside is too thin

for the fuel-heavy plane
to climb any higher.

The pilots have
only two choices:

Fly straight through the storm,

or try to navigate around it.

Bonin: You get some sleep?

David Robert: So-so.

Dubois: Well, then,
I am out of here.

Bouillard: Captain Dubois
takes his scheduled rest.

Narrator:
First Officer David Robert

relieves the more
experienced captain.

Robert has almost
4,000 more hours flying the A330

than the other first officer
on the flight deck.

Bouillard: First Officer Robert
is in the left-hand seat.

First Officer Bonin is the pilot
flying in the right-hand seat.

Narrator: Investigators now know
that minutes before the crash,

the captain left the cockpit
for his break.

Robert: Maybe don't you want
to go to the left a bit?

Narrator: But it's unclear

which of the two remaining
pilots is in command.

Bonin: Excuse me.

Robert: You can possibly go
a bit to the left.

Learmount: The way they acted

when the captain
had left the flight deck

was not as if one of them
was definitely in charge

and the other one was
definitely the supporting pilot.

Narrator: The confusion over
their roles becomes critical

when the plane hits a column
of ice crystals in the cloud.

The ice crystals
pound the plane.

Ice envelops the pitot tubes.

Bouillard: The ice crystals
are filling the pitot tubes.

Airspeed readings
are no longer valid.

Narrator: The pilots
don't know their airspeed--

a scenario they had not
been trained for.

Bouillard: That is
the autopilot disconnecting.

Bonin: I have the controls.

Robert: What's that?

Narrator: Stall warnings
begin to blare in the cockpit

as Bonin lifts the nose.

Finally, investigators know

which pilot put the plane
into a stall.

Bouillard:
First Officer Bonin is pulling
back and stalling the plane.

Narrator:
Unable to rely on computers,
as modern pilots now do,

confusion ensues.

Bouillard: Officer Robert

doesn't understand
what's happening.

Learmount: He sees
the airplane going up

and he sees
the airspeed dropping,

and he says,
"hey, watch your airspeed."

Robert: We've lost the...
The speed.

Narrator: The pilots need to
push the plane's nose down

to gain speed.

But Bonin keeps
pulling the nose up.

Bonin: Ok. Ok. Ok.

I'm going back down.

Robert: According to all three,
you're going up.

So go back down.

Narrator: Under stress,
Bonin acts on instinct.

He pulls up to go up--
the right move to lift off,

but the wrong move
at cruising altitude.

Bouillard:
They're doing everything wrong.

It should be obvious
what to do.

Narrator: Desperate to save
his 216 passengers,

First Officer David Robert
summons the captain.

If Bonin simply let go
of the controls,

the plane would gain speed.

Robert: Do you understand
what's happening?

Bonin: I'm losing
all control of the plane.

Sartorius: When they get here,

they are falling at more than
6,200 feet per minute.

Bouillard: So they still have
about two minutes left

to figure out what's happening.

Narrator: First Officer Robert
decides to take control.

Robert: Controls to the left.

Narrator: He tries to push
the nose of the plane down--

a key step
for recovering from a stall.

But still confused,
Bonin continues to pull back.

Sartorius: They can use their
side sticks at the same time.

If both go
in different directions,

they have a tendency
to cancel each other out.

Learmount:
The fact that the two pilots

were making different and
sometimes opposite inputs

to the side stick controls
was pretty surprising.

The two pilots were not
coordinating their thinking

or their actions.

Narrator: 90 seconds
after the crisis began,

the captain returns.

Dubois:
What the hell are you doing?

Robert: We've lost all control
of the aircraft.

We don't understand anything,
but we've tried everything.

Learmount:
Because they weren't believing

the situation
that they were now in,

they just went back
to basic instinct,

which is, "I want to go up,
I want to stop falling.

Let's pull the nose up."

Narrator:
Dubois scans the instruments,

trying to see what's gone wrong.

Robert: What do you think?
What do we need to do?

Dubois: I don't know.
It's going down.

Bouillard: The captain
doesn't have enough time

to assess the situation.

Bonin: We're at 9,000 feet.

Robert:
Climb. Climb. Climb. Climb.

Bonin: But I've been
at maximum nose up for a while.

Narrator:
Finally Dubois understands.

First Officer Bonin
is causing the stall

by pulling the nose up.

Dubois: No!
No! No! Don't climb!

Bouillard:
By the time they figure it out,

it's too late.

Narrator:
Robert can't get enough lift

to recover from the stall.

At 2,000 feet,

sensors detect
the ocean's surface

and trigger new alarms.

Bonin: We're going to crash.

This can't be true.

But what's happening?

Narrator:
The aircraft hits the water

at almost 124 miles per hour.

Bouillard:
Hearing the conversations

on the cockpit voice recorder
for the first time

was a big moment.

It left us speechless.

Troadec:
Alain Bouillard was all pale.

At that moment he understood
the distress the crew was in

during the last moments
of the flight.

Narrator:
By the summer of 2011,

salvage crews recover 104 bodies

from the submerged wreckage
of flight 447,

including that of Brad Clemes.

Clemes: My brother was amongst
those that were raised,

so it enabled us to recover him,

to bring him home,

and to conduct
a service properly

and to say
our goodbyes properly,

so it helped.

Narrator: More than three years
after the accident,

Alain Bouillard announces that
the downing of flight 447

was not caused
by the frozen pitot tubes,

but by the crew's failure

to understand
and rectify the situation.

Bonin: This can't be true.

But what's happening?

Clemes: There was a feeling

that these planes
were so sophisticated,

they could fly by themselves.

The pilots weren't even trained
to fly this type of plane

on manual at high altitudes

because the thought was

that they would always be
on autopilot

so there was no reason for
the pilot to know how to fly it.

Narrator:
New training is now in place

to teach crews how to deal
with unreliable airspeed

and how to recover from a stall
at high altitudes.

Learmount: The airlines
have to be prepared

to spend more money

on fundamental
manual flying training

and cognition training
for their pilots.

Air France 447
is just the accident

where you can't
ignore it any longer.

And changes have to come.