If a commercial airplane "lost" it's pilots mid-flight, do you think the passengers could fly it?

Well it's easy to fly but landing is the part that you will die if you don't know what you are doing cuz you will crash

Check out the video in link below

The mythbuster are seeing if they can land a plain with no idea

It could be that a person could be guided to land a plane. For the simple fact that it is better than crashing. It is not the same flying a commercial airliner and a smaller plane. The guy or girl flying it has to have nerves of steel.

Well the most qualified should fly the plane because you now have every single passengers life in their hands . But I think either a flight attendant would take charge or in your case if you would have to fly the plane air control would tell you what to do & guide you through to land the plane as safely and as soon as possible.

All commercials airlines today have a 2 press button that automatically takes control of the plane all the way through landing, that the flight attendants know how to use in case both pilots become unable.

Nearly all commercial airlines can be flown and landed by radio control from ground control (think flight simulator), or by the pre-programmed auto-pilot. These movies from the '70's where passengers or flight attendants have to fly would never become a reality today. If the flight crew were disabled, chances are the passengers would never know.

Today's commercial pilots (while still highly trained, and very competent) are in those seats to take over in the event of computer or hardware failure, and to make adjustments to navigation while in-flight. According to my friend (who is a commercial pilot), he and the co-pilot "actively" fly the aircraft for mere minutes... and for efficiency, the airlines would prefer them to utilize the auto-pilot under "normal flight".

Take-off and landing the plane is 95% of their active participation (his words), but he has assured me that if necessary, most commercial aircraft (jumbo jets all the way to tiny regional jets) are capable of being landed by auto-pilot, or ground control remote (much like flying a simulator).

Where your problems would occur would be DURING the final moments of actual decent, where the auto-pilot is disengaged. If pilots were landing "manually" and were to become incapacitated at that point, there may not be time to take control from the ground, or for anyone to enter the flight deck to engage the auto-pilot (or abort the decent).

You said you had a family member that is a pilot, you should already know this... the info is not confidential... Someone else mentioned the episode of MythBuster's where they received instruction to land a (simulated) plane via instructions over the radio... The instructor in that episode clearly said that the majority of all US airlines have the capability of landing a plane via auto-pilot, so having to talk a civilian through the process would be a VERY rare occurrence!

I've thought about that... I suppose most times the passenger would just be engaging "Otto" the pilot and wait. Wouldn't work in really bad weather or on some older planes though. Clear the runways...

I've always wondered if I'd be able to fly the plane, if for some reason, ... Haven't you seen any movies. A 12 year old kid can land the plane.

if the plane is stable and flying enroute...

the passengers won't notice until the engines die due to fuel starvation and then it's too late to start learning to fly the aircraft

Did you ever see the spongebob episode where he is trying to drive the boat and there is all the buttons and things. Yeah its like that. Or the family guy episode where they try to get Quagmires job back and they have to land the plane because he wasn't on it? Its like that too

Haven't you seen any movies. A 12 year old kid can land the plane.