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(plane engines roaring) (slow music) - [Reporter] It's just after lunch onboard Qantas Flight 72 from Singapore to Perth. - Sir, would you like a drink? - [Reporter] Qantas flight attendant Fuzzy Maiava is busy attending to passengers in the cabin. - [Fuzzy] Orange juice for you, madam. - If I can make your flight a lot easier, I'm your man. And I thought it was going to be another great day, yeah. - [Reporter] Up in the cockpit. - How's everything going? - [Pilot] Very good. - [Reporter] Captain Kevin Sullivan has just climbed back into his seat after a rest break, when suddenly. (instruments beeping) The plane's autopilot disconnects. - Autopilot one appears to have disconnected. - And then we started getting stall warnings. (alarm ringing) - [Man] Stall, stall. - And then we started getting overspeed warnings. - [Man] Stall, stall. - [Reporter] And then it happens. (dramatic music) - [Man] Stall, stall. (alarm ringing) Stall, stall. - The plane, it started going down, pitching down violently down. - [Reporter] Tonight for the first time the previously untold story of Qantas' worst ever accident. - Bang, my head went through the cabin ceiling. - [Reporter] How a plane went psycho, injuring 100 passengers and crew. - You died six or seven times on the operating table. - I am lucky to be here alive. - [Reporter] And destroying once happy lives. - It got to the point where I tried to take my own life. - [Man] Stall, stall. - [Reporter] The hero pilot who fought against his own plane to save his passengers and crew. - [Man] Stall, stall. - The automation is there to keep you safe, and was actually trying to kill us. - [Reporter] And how the lessons of Qantas Flight 72 have gone unheeded. - All of us are deeply sorry for the loss of life. - [Reporter] With two planes crashing within six months of each other, killing all 346 people on board. - When you see what's happening with the 737 MAX accidents, they're the same. They were in no man's land. They didn't know what was happening. And their instinctive reaction to pull back and stop the ground from hitting them was not enough to save the day. (slow music) - [Reporter] Kevin Sullivan doesn't fly anymore. What happened that day in the skies over the Indian Ocean has affected him profoundly. - I could have hidden it, but I think it's more courageous to be honest with yourself and honest to say yeah, it's affected me. I don't shirk my responsibility as a commercial pilot and the captain. I reached the point where it was best that I stop. - [Reporter] Growing up in California, Kevin always dreamed of being a pilot. And by his early 20s he was a Top Gun fighter pilot in the US Navy. - As a F-14 pilot in the Cold War I flew off aircraft carriers, the landing area moves. At night you can't see the landing area until you're actually on it. We were essentially at war. We trained and flew to that level of extreme readiness. - [Reporter] Then came an opportunity to flyMirage jets as part of an exchange programme with the Royal Australian Air Force. - It's a speed machine. At low level I've been very fast, over 600 knots, 1,200 kilometres an hour. (rock music) - [Reporter] The young American loved Australia and those jets so much he ended up settling here. After you, Kevin. - Thank you. How did you organise this? - [Reporter] What do you think? - [Kevin] Yeah, it's pretty special. - [Reporter] The Mirage III, there she is. - We called it the French lady, or the Aussies did, and I do too. No, you can't stand on the seat. - You need a degree just to get in. 35 years along life's runway and Kevin Sullivan's love for his French lady hasn't dimmed. - It's just like getting into a Formula 1 car. You don't have much room. It becomes part of you. - Not a bad place to hone your skills. - There's no automation on this thing. - (laughs) You need to know how to fly this one by hand, I tell ya. Kevin eventually moved onto a job with Qantas flying its biggest passenger jets. (plane engines roaring) - How's everything going? - Smooth sailing. - [Reporter] By October 2008, he's had decades of experience as a commercial pilot. But it's his time as a Top Gun that will prove crucial. - We were coming up to the northwest coast of Australia. We could see it out the windscreen. And the Indian Ocean was calm and blue. - [Reporter] On this clear, blue day at the controls of a Qantas Airbus, Captain Kevin Sullivan is about to be tested in the most dramatic way possible. (instruments beeping) - Autopilot one appears to have disconnected. - When was the first indication of trouble? - The autopilot disconnected. And then we started getting stall warnings. - [Man] Stall, stall. (alarm ringing) Stall, stall. - It sounds like, "Stall, stall." It means the plane will stop flying, it will start to go down. And then we started getting overspeed warnings. - [Man] Stall, stall. - Stall warning and overspeed at the same time. - It's impossible. - It doesn't make sense to me because overspeed is you're at your maximum limit and stall it means you're at your minimum speed limit. - What the hell? Get Pete back in here. - First officer to the flight deck, please. - And then the plane started moving. And initially it was a dip. (dramatic music) - [Man] Stall, stall. (alarm ringing) - And then it started going down, pitching down aggressively and violently down. (alarm ringing) It generated a force that we had to brace ourselves against the instrument glare shield to stop from basically hitting the ceiling, even with our seat belts secured. I was accelerating down towards the Indian Ocean and certainly my windscreens were filled with the Indian Ocean. - [Man] Stall, stall. (alarm ringing) - QF72 is in a death dive and refusing to let Kevin take control. This is my broader understanding. So the plane's flying along. The sensors are giving some sort of information at the computer system that the plane is pointed upwards so it tries to overcorrect. And then obviously points you back down. Is that a fair summary? - Yes, in a way. It's saying, "Sorry, Kev, I'm protecting you. "So I'm not going to let you stop me." Like the HAL 9000 in "2001: A Space Odyssey" where Dave asks him to open the pod bay doors and HAL says, "I'm sorry, Dave. "I can't let you do that." I'm pulling back on the stick and I'm saying, "Hey, HAL, stop moving the nose." And it's like, "I'm sorry, Kev, I can't let you do that." - [Man] Stall, stall. - [Reporter] But no way is this proud ex-fighter pilot going to let a rogue computer beat him. - [Man] Stall, stall. - I was in a near death position and I was going to fight to the death to make sure that didn't happen. (mid-tempo music) - [Reporter] Qantas Flight 72 from Singapore is cruising comfortably at 37,000 feet. - [Woman] I'll have a glass of white wine, please. - Glass of white wine. - [Reporter] In just over two hours, the Airbus A330 will land in Perth. It's been a routine flight. Some of the passengers onboard are off duty Qantas staff returning from holidays. Among them, Bruce Southcott, a flight services manager travelling with his wife, Caroline. - Aircraft was flying flat and still. And I watched the glass of wine sit there without a ripple. (alarm ringing) - [Man] Stall, stall. - [Reporter] But up in the cockpit the plane's flight control system is going haywire. - [Man] Stall, stall. - [Reporter] The aircraft's computers are telling Captain Kevin Sullivan his plane is about to stall. - [Man] Stall, stall. - [Reporter] And then suddenly the plane is hurtling down towards the Indian Ocean. - There wasn't really any first sign. It just happened. Like the hand of God had just pushed the aircraft down. There was no woo, let's go, as a rollercoaster. It was just like, slam. - [Reporter] Bruce is wearing his seat belt. (dramatic music) But Caroline is just coming back from the toilet. - I remember getting hit on the head with the plane. And I just went bang. And before I could think, bang again. And then the third bang, my head went through the cabin ceiling. After the third time it hit me on the head I pretty much was knocked out. - [Reporter] An off duty Qantas pilot, Peter Casey and his wife, Diana, a Qantas customer service manager, have left their seats to say hello to flight attendant Fuzzy Maiava. - Fuzzy, God love him, was down there checking out the catering, as he does. The three of us chatting away. - I placed my meal in the oven. I was focused on the timer, you see, 'cause I was hungry. And then when I saw the exact time on it, it was 13 seconds. And that's when I saw the corner of my eye someone had just shot up. And I just sort of looked down and the plane was disappearing from my feet. (body thudding) - I heard a slight change in the airflow of the aeroplane, and I thought, oh, this is interesting. And the next thing you know, whomp, up we went. - I must have hit something, must have hit the ceiling 'cause I just, I was knocked out. - The three of us up in the ceiling probably only for seconds but it seemed like an eternity. - [Reporter] The Casey's daughters, 17-year-old Becky and 18-year-old Elise, are at the front of the cabin. - The first nosedive, my sister, she grabbed onto the bottom of her chair, and she looked up at me as I was on the top of the aeroplane. - [Reporter] You were actually pinned to the ceiling? - Yeah. - [Reporter] Feel like forever? - It did. It felt like a few minutes. (alarm ringing) - [Reporter] Back in the cockpit, Kevin Sullivan is desperately trying to take back control of his plane. - [Man] Stall, stall. - We're basically fighting for our lives at this stage. - They had to very quickly discover what part of the aeroplane was trying to kill them and how to stop it from doing so. - [Reporter] If there's any other pilot who understands exactly what Captain Sullivan is facing, it's the other Sully. Captain Chesley Sullenberger lost both his engines in a bird strike and had to land his plane in New York's Hudson River. - Captain, I'd like your insight if I could. I'm trying to tap into I guess the anguish of that moment, what it must have been like for the pilot. - Well at first it would have been confusing, surprising, a huge startle factor. And then one would immediately begin to act to regain control of the aeroplane. - [Reporter] Kevin Sullivan's next move is completely counter-intuitive. Instead of pulling back on the control stick, he lets it go. - I have a choice to make, do I hold onto it, or do I release it? My military training for out of control is to release, neutralise controls. - [Reporter] It works. The plane is no longer falling from the sky. But now passengers are being smashed back down to the floor. (dramatic music) (metal clanging) - We heard an almighty crash coming from the cabin. And that was the people's bodies. That was the galleys coming apart. And it sounds like a 40 foot shipping container full of cutlery and glass that is sent down a ramp into a brick wall. - I just came crashing down. My sister, she was eating, and her fork went in my arm. (laughs) Got a bit stuck when I came down. It's the little things that you remember. - When I came back down I hit the armrest. - Armrest, yeah. - And then I realised that all my bones were clicking in my back, and I realised that there was something terribly wrong, very wrong. I couldn't move off the floor. The staff were asking me to go back to my chair. And I couldn't get up at all, I couldn't move my legs at all. - [Reporter] Your legs weren't working? - Nope. My ankle was broken. So my ankle was just sort of hanging. Eventually another passenger came and picked me up and put me in my chair. - Hit the galley bench. That's what woke me up. All I could hear was the crushing sounds my knee is going. I don't know what the heck is going on. All I see is blood rushing out of Peter's head. And Diana, she's unconscious. And then I see the two girls I was looking after. Oh man, one of them who was sat on the aisle seat, she stuck her hand out to me and she was just crying. And to me, that's like my own daughter. I mean, I just couldn't do anything. And I just felt so helpless because I couldn't move. (dramatic music) - [Reporter] Back in the cockpit, Kevin Sullivan has pulled the plane out of its death dive. - What the hell was that? - [Reporter] But he's still fighting for control. - It's the primary flight computer. - Now we're in this revolver of faulting systems. - In effect, this is a total system collapse. - The plane is starting to melt down. - Automatic brake's not working. Four is not working. - Let's get us back up to 37,000 feet. - I'm still pretty coherent. Yes, my cages are a little bit rattled because we don't know what's happening. - [Reporter] And just two minutes later-- - Don't you do it. - [Reporter] It happens again. (dramatic music) - I'm basically a passenger, I'm an observer now. The automation that's there is supposed to be keeping me safe, not putting me into harm's way. And I got very angry. - I thought it was the end. - Really? It was so violent you thought you were going to die? - Yeah. I think being so young as well and not having experienced life outside of high school yet, you don't really know what to expect in the big world. And honestly, I just thought that was it. - All I could hear was the sounds that we were going to die. But you just hope to God that it happens quick. - Death? - Yes, and I don't want to feel any pain. I was frozen like a block of ice just waiting for it to happen. (slow dramatic music) - [Reporter] Once again, Kevin Sullivan's military training saves his plane. - We have lost auto pitch trim. - [Reporter] But he has no idea if, or when, it will happen again. - Another failure in trim three. Reset? - No, no. - [Reporter] Everyone responds to trauma differently. Kevin Sullivan cracks a joke. He picks a line from another of his favourite movies, "Flying High". - Looks like I picked a bad day to quit sniffing glue. - [Reporter] First Officer Peter Lipsett had been on a break when the plane went into its dive. He's injured, but he makes it back to the cockpit. - That's a shit fight out there. I think I've just broken my nose. - Congratulations. Strap in, we're in trouble. - I made the assessment that we were in trouble. And I've never used those terms in any situation prior to that in my extreme flying career. (instruments beeping) - Mayday, mayday, mayday, Qantas 72, Qantas 72, flight control computer malfunctions and we have significant injuries onboard. - [Reporter] Kevin Sullivan is in the fight of his life. The Qantas captain has twice managed to stop his out of control plane from plunging into the Indian Ocean. - Tracking direct to Learmonth. - [Reporter] He needs to get his 315 passengers and crew down onto the ground fast before it happens again. He heads for the nearest airport, the RAAF base at Learmonth on Western Australia's northwest coast. - I couldn't risk exposing myself and the passengers to an out of control aeroplane any longer than I had to. And Learmonth was just off our left wing, and that's where we decided to go. - [Reporter] In the cabin behind him, more than 100 passengers are injured. - [Woman] What's happening? - [Reporter] Many have been knocked unconscious. Others have broken bones and bleeding wounds. - Ladies and gentlemen, this is the flight deck. All passengers to fasten seat belts immediately. - [Reporter] Caroline Southcott is in absolute agony. Her back is broken, and a single piece of skin is keeping her foot attached to her leg. But she no choice, she has to sit in her seat. - I was really worried my bones were going to go through my spinal cord, so I had to hold myself up on the armrest for it must have been 45, 50 minutes. - It wouldn't have been easy 'cause she said she could physically feel and hear her spine just grating like that against each other. - Yeah, it was a very funny noise. Prior to that I've never had pain, bad pain. So it was a matter of life and death. It was a matter of suck it up, princess, you've got to do something here. (both laughing) - [Reporter] Caroline now notices that her nearly severed left foot is facing backwards. - During all this pain she looked down at her ankle and said, "That's not right. "I'm not happy with that." She pulled the ankle forward, rotated it, and clicked it back into place. - Yeah, reset it. I think there was no choice. It was fight or die. - [Reporter] In the rear galley Peter and Diana are all badly injured. Fuzzy is desperate to get to the two unaccompanied children he is looking after, but his legs won't work. - I couldn't even move. I wanted to, I tried so much to reach out. And I knew I could not move. - [Reporter] Peter is bleeding profusely from a head wound. Diana has suffered a badly injured back and shoulder. But somehow, she finds the strength to help the people around her. (slow music) - I tell you what, Diana, man, she was incredible. She's like, she reminded me of The Hulk. You know, adrenaline came out of her and she could lift anything. And she made it happen. And I can hear Diana saying, "Okay, Fuzzy, you're next." - Come on, nearly there. - [Fuzzy] Man. - [Diana] There we go, just going to put your belt on. - She was incredible. I'm telling you right now, man, that lady deserves recognition for what she did. - [Reporter] Pretty amazing wife you have there. - Mm, very proud of her. Very proud. - Diana Casey is one of the true heroes of this story, but you won't hear her speak. It's an slap in the face to Diana's extraordinary courage, but Qantas has refused to let Diana or any of its current staff be interviewed for this programme. As a former employee, Fuzzy Maiava isn't bound by such small-minded constraints. - How on Earth did she manage to get Fuzzy, if you'll allow me, a reasonably big unit, up off the ground into the seat? - Oh man, she just sort of like just grabbed my hands, and just grabbed me. And I felt like I was being pulled by a 6'8" (laughs) athlete, you know. And then she just looked at me and she just shook me and says, "We're going to be okay," and she gave me a kiss on the forehead and said, "You're going to be fine." - In circumstances like that the pilot in the cockpit gives an order for people to sit down immediately. Well, that's what they got to do. But in this circumstance there were people that were unsecured, and she took it upon herself to break the protocol because a need to, and I totally completely agree with her, there was a need to, to care for people that needed to be secured. (dramatic music) - Final check. - [Reporter] With dozens of his passengers requiring urgent medical attention, Kevin Sullivan now has to land his crippled Airbus A330 on that remote airfield at Learmonth. - Okay, we're on visual approach. Manual thrust. Manual pitch trim. - [Reporter] He's now flying his aircraft entirely by hand. But Kevin knows that at any moment, the plane's computer might try to wrest back control. - Gear down. (instruments beeping) - [Kevin] 1,000 feet, but now we know that at this point if something happens we don't have the altitude to recover. - Don't you do it. (tyres squealing) (people applauding) - I remember when we landed, everyone clapped. - Kevin's job was outstanding under what I would believe to be immense pressure. - [Reporter] Did you allow yourself just the briefest moment to look down at your arms and legs and think, my goodness, I'm alive? - No, I made another quip. I did my Arnie impersonation from True Lies. I said, "Ya, a little bit of excitement, "otherwise dull day," as we're rolling down-- - You're not even joking, are you? - I'm serious, yeah, of course, because yeah, okay, so that's my release. - [Reporter] Only now is Kevin Sullivan able to walk back through his aircraft to inspect the damage. (dramatic music) (child crying) - I call it the walk that changed my life. It's quite confronting. The interior of the cabin was almost destroyed. There are holes above the seats where passenger's heads have punctured the plastic, and there's lots of 'em. Of course, there were children, children had huge contusions on their heads where some were bleeding, and the parents are holding their children, trying to console them. As I walked past, the look of, look what you did to my kid, will never leave. - There was almost a moment for you as you made that walk where you felt it that your heart was breaking. Is that true? - Yes. Time out. (laughs) So this is a critical part. That's a valid question. - I imagine that's one of the most significant moments of your life. I'm the head honcho. I'm the one that has to show leadership and strength. But it's pretty hard when emotional chunks are being ripped off you as you move through the aeroplane. (dramatic music) - [Reporter] Qantas Flight 72 has landed at the remote Learmonth air strip on the northwest coast of Western Australia. Captain Kevin Sullivan has brought his plane down safely. But with so many lives in the balance, the emergency is far from over. (sirens wailing) Local rescue crews swarm through the plane. - The emergency services crew came onboard, and it was just like, it was chaos. The pain was unbearable. I think I nearly passed out. And the next minute I got a morphine stick stuck in my mouth. Yeah, "Suck on that, big fella." - I imagine that was a pretty big relief. - Yeah, he said, "Suck on that, big fella." I can remember that, "Suck on that, big fella." (muffled talking) - The safest course of action was for me to come into here, not only because of the aeroplane behaviour but also the injuries that we've all sustained. - [Reporter] In the terminal, Captain Sullivan grabs a megaphone and addresses the passengers who've made it off the Airbus uninjured. (muffled talking) - The runway looked pretty good to me. (people laughing) (people applauding) I made some comment about the runway looked pretty damn good to me as we rolled out for landing. And at that point, everybody was cheering again. (dramatic music) - [Reporter] Kevin is relieved to be on the ground, but he now knows what was happening in the cabin while he was wrestling for control of the plane. More than 100 passengers are injured, some critically. - There were accelerated into the ceiling and with such a force that their heads broke through the plastic-- - It's not soft. - [Kevin] It's aviation grade plastic. (dramatic music) - [Reporter] The most seriously injured are airlifted to Perth by the Royal Flying Doctor Service. Among them, Caroline Southcott. - The pain in my back, it was pretty bad. I can remember just fighting to keep breathing, because I thought if I stop breathing I'll go unconscious and then no one's going to get me back. - You're initially thinking about, well, what's post-injury going to be like? How is she going to walk, and will she walk, and all that. And then they take it to the next level and say to ya, "Well no, what we're saying here "is that her survival is in doubt." And that's when I went, "Oh." That's when you do freak. - [Reporter] She's rushed into emergency surgery with a broken back. Her life is slipping away. - You died six or seven times on the operating table. - I'm lucky I can walk and I'm lucky to be here alive, yeah. - How would you describe the surgery that Caroline went through? - In her graphic terms? - [Reporter] Yeah. - "They cut me down here and then they put me gizzards "on the table so they could get to it." Like your spine's on your back, as everyone knows. But the injury had to be addressed from the front of the spine. So they had to do all that. And then put everything back in place and stitch her up. - They put it on the table and did their work and then they put it back in again. - Threw it back in. - [Reporter] But there's pain behind Caroline's laughter. Her body is now a miracle of surgical architecture. - They were able to replace my vertebrae with a cage, and biological cement and bone from my hip that I can even move. It's not 100%, but it's better than it was. Here they come. - Geesey, geesies. - Come on goosey, goosey, goose. - [Bruce] Food. - [Reporter] Then there's the mental anguish. Nowadays, Bruce and Caroline live as near recluses on their property in Queensland. It's one of the few places they feel safe. (slow music) Becky refuses to fly and lives with the trauma every day. - [Reporter] I can see how painful it is, these memories that you're still living with. It's still very real. - Very. Very. - How has this changed you? - I'm quite an emotional ball now. (laughs) I saw psychologists. They diagnosed me with PTSD. It's not a fun thing to have when you're 17. I was medicated until I was pregnant with my first child, and that's when I had to come off them. Yeah, it's not a nice thing when you're a teenager. - [Reporter] Flight attendant Fuzzy Maiava can't work anymore because of his injuries. - I had to replace both knees. I have now got two titanium knees. And I ruptured a spleen and my spine. I have seven damaged discs. That's a pain I get every day, and they trigger on the nightmares and the flashbacks. (dramatic music) It's really severe, it's really bad. I can't even sleep properly at night. I toss and turn, and that's when the flashbacks come. So in order for me to get around that, I keep hitting the wall just to ground myself. - Gee, Fuzzy, that is an enormous thing for one person to have to deal with. Even now you're still having flashbacks, still hitting the wall. - Mate, it got to a point, the seriousness of it, it got to the point where I tried to take my own life. I ended up in ICU for a coma for a week because I couldn't take it any longer. The pain was unbearable. I had been medically retired as well, and I thought to myself, what's happening? It was like I'd been just discarded. - Some of the victims of QF72 received six-figure payouts, but not Fuzzy. As an employee, Qantas offered him just $33,000, a settlement he rejected on legal advice. In the end, this proud man was left with nothing. Fuzzy, do you feel as though you were properly supported? - Like I said, I have the greatest respect for Qantas. - [Reporter] It's a tough question, I know. - Yes. - I can see that even now you're reluctant to criticise the airline that you loved. But the reality is that for you some support, any support would have made the world of difference. - It would have helped me and my family a great deal, to be honest. - [Reporter] Kevin Sullivan didn't suffer any physical injuries, but the events of that day continue to haunt him. Three years ago, he made the difficult decision to stop flying. - You hold onto those images, those memories as if they were yesterday. And that's just what your brain does when you're in this sort of near-death traumatic experience. Your brain records in high definition, and it stays in there. It doesn't go away. (dramatic music) - [Reporter] Qantas Flight 72 was cruising at 37,000 feet when the onboard computer suddenly went haywire. (alarm ringing) - [Man] Stall, stall. - [Reporter] Sending the plane hurtling downwards. The Australian Transport Safety Bureau blamed incorrect data for the emergency, but it hasn't been able to explain how or why that happened. It all sounds eerily similar to the recent Boeing MAX crashes. (slow music) In those two cases, flight computers reacted to faulty data. The pilots couldn't regain control of their planes, and 346 people died. - It's important also to remember that while humans are often the least predictable part of the safety system, they are by far the most resilient and adaptable, the ones who can confront a challenge they've never seen before, and in a short period of time figure out a way to solve even that crisis. (people cheering) - [Reporter] Captain Chesley Sullenberger, the hero of the Hudson River landing, believes that replacing pilot skills with increased automation is a fatal mistake. - What we've learned in aviation is that automation does not decrease errors. But it changes the nature of errors that are made. As we use more and more technology in the cockpits, we must always make sure that the humans are in complete control of the aircraft and its flight path. (mid-tempo music) - [Reporter] As a former elite fighter pilot, Kevin Sullivan had the skills to bring his plane down safely. The passengers and crew of QF72 know they were incredibly lucky. - This guy saved my life. And he gave me an opportunity to be here, and I am breathing, I'm here, I'm here in the flesh because of that man. - [Reporter] Fuzzy Maiava is now campaigning to get Captain Sullivan and his flight crew the recognition they deserve. - I think they deserve the Qantas Diamond Chairman Award, and also the Cross of Valour. I believe that's Australia's highest civilian bravery award. So if you're out there, please sign that petition so it'll help get Kevin and his men acknowledged and recognised for what they did. - We owe our lives, period. - Mm, yeah, everyone does. - Do you think he should be recognised for that? - [Caroline] Absolutely. - Knighted. (laughs) - Knighted. He definitely saved 315 people's lives. - [Bruce] Yeah. - [Reporter] Hero? - Definitely. Definitely, without a doubt. - [Reporter] What would you say to him? - Thank you. And give him a big hug. - [Reporter] Becky can't get on a plane to deliver that hug. (slow music) But Fuzzy Maiava has bravely cast aside his fear of flying and flown from New Zealand to thank his hero in person. - And I know you still think about the passengers. They're very top of mind for you. We actually have one of them here now to say a bit of a hello. - Is that right? - He's just over there, over your left shoulder. You might remember this young man. - Kevin, hey, come on. Oh, mate. (laughs) Good to see you, my brother. - Fuzzy. - Good to see you. (laughs) - [Kevin] Yeah. - Oh, mate, you look-- - Welcome. - Thank you. Oh, my brother. Oh, mate. Mate. - [Reporter] He has been dying to see you, Kev. - I have been, yeah. - Fuzzy, is this the first time you've flown? - Yes, this is the first. Mate, I've been dying to meet up with you. You're the reason I'm here. If it wasn't for you, Kevin, we would not be here. - Well-- - And I'm serious. - Thank you, Fuzzy. - A lot of people may have said it's their job, they get paid for it. No, this is very unique. And that's why I was so passionate in trying to get this in the public realm to get the Qantas Group and the Australian government to acknowledge and recognise you because this is something unique and it's unheard of. And that's why I'm so passionate and I'll never give up. I will never give up for you, brother. I will never give up. (men laughing) - [Reporter] And those calls for recognition are taking off. What Kevin Sullivan achieved that day has come to represent a line in the sand for pilots who refuse to relinquish any more control of their planes to computers. - Captain Sullivan, from one Sully to another, I congratulate you on having built and led your team well in facing such an extreme crisis on QF72, keeping your passengers and crew safe. And since you're a former US Navy naval aviator and fighter pilot, bravo zulu, I salute you.