How 3 AMAZING Pilots Made A Near Impossible Landing | Eastern Airlines Flight 935

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This is the story of eastern airlines flight 935, On the 22nd of september 1981 eastern airlines flight 935 was to fly from Newark to san juan in puerto rico. The plane that theyd be flying was lockheeds L1011, arguably one of the most sophisticated planes in the sky. You could even say that the L1011 was ahead of its time. On that day by about 10:57 am the plane got its taxi clearance and it began to taxi to runway 22L at newark, In a few short minutes the plane was airborne and climbing away from newark. So far so good nothing concerned them about the plane. But as they passed through 800 feet something caught the pilots eye, the fan of engine number two the one in the tail was vibrating a bit too much, the airborne vibration monitor or the AVM had activated momentarily. The flight engineer was checking to see if something was wrong with the engines as far as he could tell all the readings were in the green nothing to be worried about but as they hit 1000 feet they pulled back power on the tail mounted engine just to be safe as per procedure. Since the l1011 had three engines theyd have more than enough power to climb and fly on two engines. But shortly after that the pilots got another warning from engine number two, this time an oil filter pressure warning light, the plane was telling them that there was a big pressure differential between the two sides of a filter, this could happen if the filter was blocked by something. Taking no chances they pulled engine number two back to idle and the captain asked the flight engineer to carry out the procedures in the abnormal procedures section of the flight manual. As the flight engineer scanned the instruments everything still seemed okay, the oil pressure was 50 psi and they had 15 quarts of oil in the system, those values were exactly what the pilots were expecting. A few moments later the pilots reestablished climb power and began the climb from 2000 feet, up to this point they had been holding at 2000 feet. But as they passed through 10,000 feet an explosion rocked the L1011, there had been no prior warning and the cockpit panels lit up with warnings like a christmas tree. The flight engineer did not like what he was seeing, they had lost engine number two the one on the tail.But losing an engine is not a death sentence but they had also lost hydraulic systems A, B and D. Now this is a problem. You see the hydraulic systems move the huge control surfaces of the jet. If you lose the hydraulics you have very little control over your jet and the crew of flight 935 had just lost three of four hydraulic systems. In the cockpit the crew sprung into action shutting engine number two down and carrying out the multiple hydraulic system failure checklist . They discharged the fire bottles in engine number two as a precaution.
The pilots knew that they were in deep trouble they requested an immediate landing at JFK international. The controllers instructed the jet to dump fuel. Slowly the weight of the jet started to fall; it went from 393,000 pounds all the way down to 345,000 pounds. At this weight they would be able to make a safe landing but the weight of the plane was far from their only concern. The loss of the hydraulic system had crippled the plane so to speak. The captain and the first officer noticed that their rudder pedals were jammed in a neutral position. Moreover the control authority of the elevators and the ailerons were significantly impacted. This meant that to get the plane to do what they wanted it to they needed to use something known as differential thrust. For example if you wanted the plane to turn right then adding more power to the left engine would put the plane into a right bank and if you wanted to turn left then adding more power to the right engine would do that. This is not standard procedure, this is what you do when you have exhausted all other options and it is very hard. Somehow the pilots coaxed their wounded jet down and made a safe landing at JFK international. The interesting thing is that