US Airways 1549 crashed in the Hudson River - January 15th 2009
I was pleasantly watching the news on CNN when the bullet for Breaking News appeared and we saw those first images of people standing on the wing of a passenger jet afloat in the New York City Hudson river. I was shocked. At first we didn’t get any numbers or any information on the fatalities (which is predictable for a emergency ditching). But as the minutes went, accounts for a miracle unfolded. All pax were alive and accounted for. The story developed further to what is believed as a double bird strike on both engines (very rare in the aviation history), damn geeses!. The plane then attempted a emergency landing at an airport nearby (Teleboro I think it was) but the Captain in Command couldn’t hold the plane until the runway. That’s when he decided to ditch in the freezing waters of the Hudson. At that point I was holding to my couch, thirsty for more info and pictures. That is when I had the idea to check out Flickr.com which is an online photo sharing website (brilliant one by the way) and started to search for pictures from the scene. I was baffled by what I had found. See below for the striking pictures.
This is a WPSimpleViewerGallery
Ditching is serious. Ditching is THE LAST RESORT for a Captain and his crew. It is quite possibly the worst scenario for an airborne vehicle. Then comes aggravating factors. Weather conditions play a huge part in surviving a ditching. Condition of the aircaft upon ditching is critical too. Cabin preparation is essential to an organized evacuation. Crowd control is another break or make factor. In training we go through horrific scenarios of ditching knowing well and good our mere chances of survival. We are told that if you make it out of a ditching, you are one of the luckiest mofo out there.
US Airways 1549 final seconds before ditching in Hudson River
Now, this particular ditching is a result of an unplanned emergency (to my knowledge) after a bird strike a few seconds after lifting off from La Guardia Airport in New York. The aircraft was airborne for 3 minutes. Not a hell a lot of time to prepare cabin for hard impact. I guess that the cabin crew were still strapped in their Jumpseat as the plane was still in a critical phase of the flight (critical phases are Taxi, Take Off and Landing). Cabin Crew would of most likely have to instruct passengers for the brace position and life jackets if they had a briefing from the Captain, and they probably did it from their jumpseat. There is no way (in my humble opinion) that they ran through the cabin and demonstrated emergency procedures to the passengers sinply because of the time frame they had in hand. The Captain made a PA announcement for a Brace most probably 30 seconds or so before ditching.
The Pilot did an amazing job at ditching the aircraft IN ONE PIECE (although reports say that the left engine dropped to the river bed soon after). This is one hell of a situation for a pilot and thank God it’s a rare one. Thankfully, and this is where you should be thankful as passengers on any airline, the crew were highly experienced and trained for this kind of emergency. This is also why flight crew get so much mooolah for their skills. Not one pilot is overpaid for saving hundreds of lives from a ditching.
And of course to optimize your chances of making it safely to your loved ones after a ditching or any kind of disaster, we recommend you to take the bloody three minutes to locate the nearest exit, read the safety card graciously provided by the airline, and follow crew guidelines and instructions which are paramount to you living such a situation. There’s a reason for each and every instruction we give you aboard the aircraft. Like having your seat upright, or why we like a healthy, english-speaker near our exits, or even having your iPod OFF for the duration of Taxi, Take Off and Landing. There’s many reasons behind each instruction. And I can safely say after flying for 9 months that half of my passengers actually took note and did what I kindly asked them to do. The other half smiling at me being absolutely ignorant. The fact is, you will not make it in one piece if you do not know where the nearest exit is, if you have comfortably reclined your seat and dosed off to your favourite playlist. And most likely, by sticking to your poor actions, you will kill the one behind you who has been to shy to alert the crew of your misbehavior.
And as Girl On Tour says : “In training we are taught ‘in theory’ that is EXACTLY how a ditching should work, plane in tact, tail heavy, evacuate out onto the wings and jump into the rafts.”
You will not see any of the US 1549 crew comment anytime soon as they’re going through a few long days of debriefing at the moment. The undergoing investigation will give us an exact insight to what happened and how it happened. I’m practically sure that in the coming months, this air crash will be a case study for all trainees in the Avaition Colleges around the world.
I say BRAVO BRAVO BRAVO to the flight crew and cabin crew onboard US Airways 1549 for their brilliant work. And also a BRAVO to the passengers who all made it out of the wreck.
If you are a pilot and would like to enlight us on these circunstances, please go forward and comment. I have based my opinions on the little knowledge I have. My judgements might be wrong.
The fact that not a single fatality was recorded is nothing short of a miracle!
BTW Flickr is blocked here! You on some sort of proxy software? They blocked mine ages ago
If you’re on a free one do you mind sending me a message via FB or something so I can download it while in IAH?
God you’re up early ! I just slept for 22 hours, God only knows how this can happen ! Sent you a message…
Coolies! Thanks for that
I always get up super early before a flight – 2 hours before pick up, sometimes more if transport is unreliable!
You slept for 22 hours…that’s more shocking than the crash…just kidding!
That is one miraculous crash. You may call it ditching, but with no time to prepare as you being a cabin crew member also testifies, this is nothing short of good pilot skills! And he ditched in the river, not the Atlantic Ocean not too far away, so even more kudos for executing that correctly. Not forgetting the cluster of Manhattan buildings so close by. Being in those frigid waters is something you definitely don’t want to be in these wintry months.
May seem appropriate to state that Emirates has never had a serious accident since inception. It’s one of the safest airlines flying around. (There was this one incident in Melbourne a few years ago of an engine exploding, which lead to an aborted take off, but that is all I can remember).
Cpt Sullenberger is an accomplished glider pilot, something which no doubt helped him keep his cool.
The river was calm, which helped the aircraft stay in one piece (as well as a textbook ditch by the crew)
The cabin crew kept the passengers calm, knowing that rescue was not far away.
The worst injury was two broken legs, maybe in the impact… most treated for hypothermia.
And it appears that for once the passengers did as thy were told and didn’t lose their heads.
(Well, all except for the guy holding his baggage as he stood on the wing)
There’s always one!
TrayT, how on earth are you able to be the first one to comment on everyone’s blogs ?? Are you a robot ?? I’m amazed at your skills or is it just the timezone playing in your favor ??
Yeah there’s always one materialistic twat in each air crash.
A question: why some passengers are wearing shoes? I thought all were supposed to take off their shoes in this situation in order to avoid any damage to the slides (life boats)…
Heels only to be taken off. And they probably didn’t have time to think about shoes with no cabin preparation.
I asked because of the woman in the left side of the 11th pic. She’s wearing heels. Anyhow, great job did by the pilot, crew and pax.
Now the Hudson is frozen, but I’m wondering what would happen if it was already frozen at the time it crashed there…
This could prove the fact they didn’t have any time to prepare the cabin. They only had a Brace command from the Captain… There’s only so much you can do with little time and warning.
Aline, not everyone listens to the crew. And is she standing on the wing?? If she was, the crew may have decided not to slow things up to make her take her shoes off as she is not goingdirectly onto a slide.
Airboy, I didn’t think I was first.. hehe… the fact I live in a different time zone to most of the other bloggers also probably helps :p I’m a night owl awake when all of you are just starting the day :p
Further comments re: Hudson have confirmed it was an unprepared ditch. F/As had no idea they were on water til they checked safe to open doors.
Re Heels/shoes : and once evac command has been ordered, I think they had something else on their mind. I do not see them stopping an evac just because misses had heels on. lolol seems a bit out of order.
Re Unprepared Ditch : Hell I could be Disaster investigator ! CNN has CCTV footage of the actual ditch, it’s quite impressive although it’s hard to see. Looks like the plane stopped within a 50 to a 100 metres. I would of thought it would glide on the water for longer. And they had the gear up which is something I learnt too. COmmon sense I guess. Can’t wait to have crew’s point of view on the whole thing…
Yep, gear up is a standard item on a ditching checklist. Same as on slide-only aircraft it’s ‘doors disarmed’ for cabin crew…
I believe the CCTV footage doesn’t show the actual point of touchdown, unless there is another, newer tape. FAs have already been quoted as telling the NTSB that they decided not to open rear doors even though it’s SOP, as doors were starting to submerge and water came in when they tried to open them.
Also, one FA apparently had a leg injury that was a cut right down through the muscle, but of course just got on with the job and didn’t realise til afterwards. All the FAs were over 30, most in their 40s or 50s with around 20 years or more of experience! Something for certain airlines to think about I’m sure
Check CNN.com for the extra footage… its there somewhere. As for the doors, we were told not to open unless the water line is beneath the door frame… Kudos to that FA. And I agree with you on the hiring extremely young FAs; like myself. ehehe
Just thought you might be interested in this : http://www.salon.com/tech/col/smith/2009/01/15/askthepilot305/index.html
Toodles!
I think that the fact pax had shoes (sorry, I’m a shoe maniac
proves also what Patrick Smith said, that a lott of pax ignores the pre-takeoff security and emegency instructions.
Well, you all know this better than me….
from now on, I’ll only use tennis shoes and sport clothes when traveling, so I can move easely if something happens.. bravo to the cabin crew there and lets hope this does not happen often..