Started shooting in Palm Beach, Florida in November 1978 according to articles in Boxoffice magazine. Articles said screenwriter Robert P. Davis was directing and that Robertson had co-written the script. "C. Gregory Earls of Cecil Prunier Productions is producing", said the Nov 20 1978 issue of Boxoffice. Apparently Robertson took over the directing chores.
Dana Andrews has been in many airplane movies; in fact, he starred in the famous cult movie Zero Hour! that was remade into the comedy smash Airplane. He also starred as a pilot in The Crowded Sky and Airport 1975.
The story about an extremely talented and experienced pilot who also happens to be an alcoholic would be the set-up for the Robert Zemeckis feature Flight starring Denzel Washington (although Washington played a drug addict as well). Both pilots make logical and even life-saving decisions despite their intoxication, and both are not only pilots but are aviation fanatics who own a small plane.
Kitty Sullivan, who plays Nancy, the stewardess who files a complaint against the title character's drinking, was the real life wife of co-star Milo O'Shea, and this was her only movie (she was on the television series The Patty Duke Show years earlier).