His Instructor Passed Out Mid-Flight. He'd Never Landed a Plane.

On 31 August 2019, a student pilot on his THIRD ever flying lesson made a mayday call over Perth, Western Australia. His instructor had slumped unconscious in the seat beside him and Max Sylvester had never landed an aircraft in his life. What follows is the real radio recording between Max and Jandakot Tower: nearly an hour of one controller calmly talking a terrified first-timer down to the ground, while Max's wife and three children watched from below. This is that call, with the key moments captioned so you can follow exactly who said what. Every word you hear is the real air traffic control audio. CHAPTERS 0:00 A student's third-ever lesson 1:07 "Emergency, emergency, emergency" 1:31 "This is my first... lesson" 1:43 The instructor is slumped over, unconscious 3:42 "Have you landed before?".. "No, I haven't" 4:07 An ambulance is called 5:34 "The best student he's had" 6:29 An instructor takes over to talk him down 6:57 "Robert's starting to wake up" 7:54 The final approach 9:26 "You did it, mate!" 10:08 The aftermath What happened next: Max landed the Cessna 152 safely after several practice approaches. His instructor, Robert Mollard, was taken to hospital in a serious but stable condition and recovered. The flight school's owner called it "a perfect landing." Max later said: "My study kicked in. That definitely saved me." If you enjoy real ATC breakdowns, Subscribe! new aviation stories every week. #aviation #atc #studentpilot #mayday #realatc #flying #cessna #emergencylanding #pilot #avgeek AUDIO CREDIT / DISCLAIMER Air traffic control audio is from the public recording of the 31 Aug 2019 Jandakot (YPJT) incident, widely reported by ABC, NBC, BBC and others. Captions are a transcript of that audio for accessibility. Visuals are illustrative/reconstructed and are not footage of the actual flight. For educational and documentary purposes.