position of the landing gear. the longer the jet remains in a holing pattern the more alarmed the first officer and flight engineer are becoming about the fuel situation. at 5:50 p.m. 18 miles south of the airport one of them speaks up, but still not forcefully. the flight engineer is staring at the fuel gauges said not enough. that s going to run us very close out here but in the precrm era you didn t challenge the authority figures. the first officer and engineer insimulated and made statements, but they were not direct. they didn t say, captain, we are running out of fuel. we have to go to the airport right now. it left denver with 40,000 pounds of fuel. only 4,000 pounds remain. the captain still thinks they can make it to the airport.