You can only imagine what is going through the minds of pilots who are flying a plane which is plummeting towards the Atlantic Ocean in free fall - but chilling recordings from the cockpit can help us fill in the blanks.
Harrowing audio captured the final conversations between captain Marc Dubois, 58, and his two co-pilots David Robert, 37, and Pierre-Cédric Bonin, 32, as they realised their doomed fate on Air France Flight 447.
All 228 onboard - made up of 12 crew members and 216 passengers - were killed when the Airbus A330-203 crashed into the Atlantic Ocean while flying from Rio de Janeiro to Paris on 1 June, 2009.
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The fear of those flying the plane is evident in the voices that are heard in the final recordings, which were taken as they began to nosedive towards the icy water beneath them - as the jet disappeared without authorities being alerted.
Days later, debris from the AirFrance jet was found floating among the waves, sparking a two-year search of the depths of the sea totalling up to costs of £27million.
One of the findings search crews made were the black box recorders, which held key information about what had occurred in the air that resulted in 288 people losing their lives.
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These electronic recording devices revealed that the plane's speed sensors - known as pitot tubes - had become blocked and iced up as the jet tried to make its way to Paris through a storm.
Due to this, the plane's systems were producing faulty data for the flight.
The autopilot on the Airbus A330-203 was disabled, while the pilots were left trying to decipher confusing data regarding their speed and altitude, which eventually saw them decide to resume manual piloting.
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But Dubois, Robert and Bonin were following the incorrect navigation data while battling through bad weather.
When the plane entered an aerodynamic stall, the trio mistakenly pointed the nose of the jet upwards instead of down.
This resulted in the Air France flight starting to tumble from the sky as the pilots had a panicked conversation.
One began: "We’ve lost our speeds!"
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"I don’t know what’s happening," another concerned voice said.
Bonin then was later heard exclaiming: "Let’s go! Pull up, pull up, pull up!"
"F***, we're going to crash! It's not true! But what's happening?" Robert screamed.
It's unclear who spoke next, but they seemed to know their fate as someone said: "F***, we're dead."
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The 205-tonne plane had plummeted 11,500metres from the sky in just four minutes and 24 seconds, tragically killing everyone on board.
All that was left was the terrified cries of the pilots for investigators to help piece what had happened together.
In 2023, a court in Paris ruled that Air France and Airbus were not guilty of manslaughter for the deaths of those on board.
Featured Image Credit: Urbanandsport/NurPhoto via Getty Images/MAURICIO LIMA/AFP via Getty ImagesTopics: World News, Travel, News, Technology