On his way to a perfect landing in the Hudson River, Captain Sully flipped the ditch switch that sealed up the plane like the armor on the Batmobile; kept the plane steady and brought the Airbus down like he was landing on a runway back at LaGuardia.
The passengers then unbuckled their seat belts and without even reaching for the overhead compartments grabbed their dual purpose seat cushions, blew some air into the little pipes on their life jackets and in an orderly fashion exited the plane. When the wing was full of people, other passengers were told to go back to another exit and get on the rafts that had more space. A couple of gentlemen even gave up their places on the wing, got back into the plane and went out a front exit onto a raft.
Captain Sully walked the plane twice to be sure that everyone got out, and then said goodbye to his ship and walked out an exit to join his passengers in waiting for help to arrive.
Chesley B. Sullenberger III has to be the coolest man alive this morning. When I heard about the ditch switch, that sealed the deal for me. Sully is a super hero. He was calm, focused, knew the right buttons to push and used his glider flying experience (an apt hobby for a superhero) to execute an otherwise routine landing on one of the nation’s businest waterways. Yes, other factors were in alignment for Captain Sully (after, of course, the unfortunate goose incident)–the weather was clear, there were no boats trolling this particular part of the river and he was apparently transporting the most serene airline passengers in the history of commercial aviation.
Witnesses reported a big splash, but Captain Sully, in true superhero fashion, deserved a grand, if unscheduled, re-entry into New York.
We so needed this hero to land in our lives right now. Captain Sully won’t fix the economy, end the war or solve the country’s health care crisis.
But I bet he could.
Update: I just had a great idea! U.S. Airways could get out of debt by allowing passengers to select flights with Captain Sully flying the plane! It could be a new search criteria for flight preferences. Kind of a Get There Safe Guarantee.
Another update: my dad just told me that Captain Sully probably won’t fly an airliner again, he’ll be promoted to the top of U.S. Airways or hired away by a huge aeronautics company. Maybe Obama will name him to be head of the FAA. Or put him on the NTSB.
Oh Sully, we hardly knew you.
Tags: airline bird problem, airline passengers, airline safety, Chesley B. Sullenberger III, geese, Hudson River, plane crash, Sully, U.S. Airways
