[COEXERJ145]

ETOPS, as others have said, stands for Extended Twin-Engine Operations. Basically the ETOPS rules govern how far a twin engine aircraft is allowed to fly from the nearest adequate airport. 120 minutes means they must always be within 2 hours of the nearest adequate airport, 180 of course is three hours and now they're looking at 207 or 240 minute ETOPS for aircraft like the 777-200LR.

The rules first came about when aircraft engines were not nearly as reliable as they are now. The chances of losing both engines due to mechanical failure is so remote that it is safe to fly the twin engine aircraft extremely long distance.

[Question_Assumptions]

I was watching a show about the Airbus that ran out of fuel and coasted to a landing on the Canary Islands. Do these twin-engine planes have that little generator propeller that pops out if the engines die so they can glide to a landing?