Imagine You Are The Pilot Of The Aircraft Below,

a Boeing 747 that you were flying for British Airways from Kuala Lumpur to Perth, on one leg of a London to Auckland flight, 

photo credit: Richard Silagi via Wikipedia and British Airways, during the night some time into the flight at 37,000 feet, the passenger compartment started filling up with blue smoke, even though there was no fire detected on board, then other members of the crew started seeing bluish flickering lights, they recognized St. Elmo's fire, but had never seen it so strong, within two minutes, the situation suddenly went from strange to alarming as engine No.4 surged and flamed out. The crew immediately performed the engine shutdown drill, cutting off the fuel supply and arming the engine fire extinguishers just as they had been trained. But less than a minute later engine two also flamed out, followed almost immediately by engines one and three. The crew could scarcely believe it: all four engines had failed almost simultaneously – something which had never happened before on a 747. The mighty airliner, had suddenly become the world’s biggest glider, they had flown through a cloud of volcanic ash, thrown up by the erupting Mount Galunggung in Indonesia, weather radar doesn't detect volcanic ash clouds, and in what can best be described as a example of British stiff upper lip, the captain announced to the 263 people onboard:

“Ladies and gentlemen, this is your captain speaking. We have a small problem. All four engines have stopped. We are doing our damnedest to get them going again. I trust you are not in too much distress.”

also the plane's interior lost its pressure and the windshield became opaque, now the questions, should they drop to a lower altitude so they could breathe, or try to maintain altitude to make it to the nearest airport in Jakarta? How would they land if they can't see? Would they have to land a 747 on the water? for the amazing true story have a look here, the photograph above is of the actual BA Boeing 747 G-BDXH, involved in the accident, 1980, what an amazing piece of flying indeed!