Is the movie “Flight of the Phoenix” based on a true story?
No. The story is a good one, and the telling of the plot is a believable one. But it is a work of fiction, from a good novel by an author named Elleston Trevor (actually Trevor Dudley-Smith, a British author who also wrote mystery and espionage books under several other names.) The possibility of converting a 2-engine cargo plane into a jerry-rigged single-engine plane from salvaged parts, without specialized equipment and an aeronautics tool shop is NOT feasable, however. When they made the first movie version in 1965, starring Jimmy Stewart and RIchard Attenborough, they “created” the plane “Phoenix” for the film, although it was handmade by a specialized aeronautics company. They tried to film the take-off the of the plane, and the stunt pilot, with more than 40 years of flying experience, named Paul Mantz, died when the plane failed to get airborne, and crashed on the film set in the California desert. The producers had to make a second one. Mantz, incidentally, was perhaps the mos
