a holding pattern, the more alarm 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 gages and said not enough. that s going to run us very close out here but in the precrm era, you didn t challenge these authority figures. the first officer and flight engineer both insinuated 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. the d.c. 8 left denver with nearly 47,000 pounds of fuel. by 5:55 p.m., only 4,000 pounds remain. but the captain still thinks they can make it to the airport. the passengers know nothing about the dire fuel situation.