Mike Ash writes:

Please elaborate. Offhand, I can't think of any change which would have
killed people here.

Fuel exhaustion, weather, system failures (pressurization, engines, you name
it), and so on.

If you want to fly on airplanes with pilots who are asleep at the switch,
that's your choice, but I don't.

According to this story, the pilots were awake and aware, and would
have eventually started wondering where they were and why ATC hadn't
talked to them yet.

When is "eventually"? They were awake, but completely unaware. Had the FA
not asked them when they would be landing, how much longer would it have taken
them to figure out that there was a problem? They spent more than an hour
goofing off without noticing anything.

They would have been able to quickly figure out their actual location,
and start talking to the appropriate people once they did. They would
have then been directed to an airport in that area that could handle
their plane. A worse outcome, certainly, but I don't see any risk to
life here.

Well, in a couple of years, they can get their PPLs again, and then you can
fly with them. They don't belong in an airline cockpit.