It's very easy to sit comfortably reading a magazine article and be judgmental of pilots who have run out fuel. Of course, the most obvious example that comes to mind is the Avianca wreck on Long Island in January, 1990. If you've ever flown into a congested area like the New York TCA, you know how a bad day can suddenly get much worse.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://www.avweb.com/features_old/one-step-short-of-declaring