A single-engine plane is over the Atlantic between the Bahamas and the Florida coast when the pilot goes silent at the controls. In the back sits a 39-year-old flooring salesman who has never touched an airplane, a magnetic compass, a friend frozen with fear, and a voice on the radio who wasn't supposed to be working that day. Join Alice and Zach for the story of a routine flight home that becomes one of the most improbable emergencies in modern aviation — and the strangers whose paths collide on a single May afternoon in South Florida.

Sources:

• "'Not today': The twin miracles of Palm Beach" by Joe Sexton - The Sunday Long Read
• "Miracle in the Air: Air Traffic Controllers Guide Passenger to Land Plane Safely" - FAA "The Air Up There" podcast
• "A passenger with no flying experience landed a plane at a Florida airport after the pilot became incapacitated" - CNN
• "'Absolutely incredible': Pilot reacts to passenger with no flight experience landing plane at PBIA" - WPBF
• ATC audio archives from Fort Pierce Tower and Palm Beach International - LiveATC.net
• Aircraft registration record for N333LD - FAA Aircraft Registry
• Surface weather observation for Palm Beach International, May 10, 2022 - Iowa Environmental Mesonet
• "Aortic Dissection" - Cleveland Clinic
• "Aortic Dissection" - American Heart Association

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.

On the morning of November 12, 2001, ninety seconds after leaving JFK, an Airbus A300 bound for Santo Domingo came apart in clear air over Queens. All 260 people aboard and five more on the ground were killed. In a city nine weeks removed from September 11th, there seemed to be only one possible explanation — and the FBI, the NTSB, and an entire grieving neighborhood spent the next three years finding out whether it was true. Join Alice and Zach for the second-deadliest aviation disaster in American history: the flight that served as a lifeline between New York and the Dominican Republic, the three-year investigation that followed, and the finding that quietly rewrote what pilots around the world are taught about their own airplanes.

Sources:

• "Aircraft Accident Report: In-Flight Separation of Vertical Stabilizer, American Airlines Flight 587, Airbus Industrie A300-605R, N14053, Belle Harbor, New York, November 12, 2001" (NTSB/AAR-04/04) — National Transportation Safety Board
• "Mayday: Air Disaster," Season 13, Episode 5 — Cineflix Productions
• "Government Indicts Second 'Shoe Bomber' In Boston" by Howard Schwach — The Wave
• "Crash of Flight 587 Remembered 21 Years Later" — The Rockaway Times
• "Dominican Americans Cope With Lasting Impact of Flight 587 Crash 20 Years Later" by Gaby Acevedo — NBC New York
• "The Grief of a Forgotten Plane Crash in Elizabeth Acevedo's 'Clap When You Land'" by Rigoberto González — NBC News

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.

A Czech gunner is shot down in no man's land in the winter of 1939 and finds something alive in an abandoned farmhouse. What follows is the story of how a German Shepherd puppy crossed occupied France, went to war, and was decorated for it — a dog who, according to the paperwork, was never there at all. Join Alice and Zach for a story about loyalty, an escape that happened twice, and a war record that officially does not exist. This episode is dedicated to Benji.

Sources:

• "Antis: Dog of War" by Damien Lewis - Royal Air Forces Association
• "The story of a Czech WW II airman and his remarkable dog" - Radio Prague International
• Dickin Medal Roll of Honour - People's Dispensary for Sick Animals
• Recorded interview with Gary Manley, owner of the Antis Dickin Medal

Find FINAL BOARDING CALL online:

• Website: finalboardingcallpodcast.com
• Email: finalboardingcallpodcast@gmail.com
• Instagram: @FinalBoardingCallPod
• Facebook: Final Boarding Call

Credits: Final Boarding Call is hosted by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas, researched and written by Alice Stern, produced and edited by Alice Stern and Zach Stemas.