It might be down and simply failing to report.

It might be down and not locked, which was worse.

There was no way, from inside the airplane, to know which, and no time left to find out.

If that gear is not locked, Davis said, very evenly, and it folds when we touch down, we go off the side of the runway.

Maya heard the thing he was not saying, which was with three hundred people and your son aboard.

You’ve never landed a commercial airliner, Davis said, and it was not a challenge now, only a last honest accounting between two people about to do a hard thing together.