Flight into Danger

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Flight into Danger is a 1956 Canadian television film starring Corinne Conley, James Doohan (who became famous later as Scotty in Star Trek: The Original Series), Kate Reid, Zachary Scott and Philip Gilbert. The 60-minute teleplay was written by Arthur Hailey, produced and screened by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and broadcast on August 20 1956 in the General Motors Theatre strand. In 1957, it was adapted into the feature film Zero Hour! and, more famously, parodied in the 1980 comedy, Airplane!. Hailey and John Castle novelised the story as Flight Into Danger: Runway Zero-Eight (1958).

In the play, a small-plane pilot is forced to take the controls of a large passenger plane when the pilots fall victim to food poisoning.

The original play was purchased for screening by the BBC in the United Kingdom and was a major factor in its producer Sydney Newman being brought across to work in the UK. There he made a significant impact on the British television drama industry.