Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, 65, was the captain of US Airways Flight 1549 that landed safely on New York’s Hudson River in January 2009, saving all 155 passengers and crew on board. The movie, “Sully,” starring Tom Hanks, opens Sept. 9. He spoke with Marc Myers.
The first time I forced myself to remain calm in a crisis I was 8. My family lived in Denison, Texas, where huge thunderstorms rolled through. One day, when the sky was…
Nearly eight years ago, millions of television viewers saw US Airways Flight 1549 floating on the frigid waters of New York’s Hudson River. Just after taking off from LaGuardia Airport, the plane crossed paths with a flock of geese, disabling both engines.
The pilot told passengers to brace for impact. The plane was losing altitude. With skill, perhaps some luck, and what can only be described as nerves of steel, the pilot glided the plane to land on the Hudson. Emergency responders rushed to the scene, and 155 passengers and crew members safely exited the aircraft by walking along the plane’s wing and onto ferries.
The last person to leave the floating plane was East Bay resident Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the veteran pilot whose quick action saved every life on Flight 1549.
Article written by: By @Niels Lesniewski, Roll Call
Flanked by the pilot who successfully landed a commercial airliner on the Hudson River, Sen. Barbara Boxer threatened Tuesday to stall a pending reauthorization of aviation policy over rest-time requirements for cargo pilots.
“We just need a vote on this, and you know if people want to come down in the well and vote the wrong way on safety, then they have shown themselves to be more concerned with the special economic interests, frankly, than the lives of the people that are being put at risk,” Boxer said. “I’m going to use every tool at my disposal to take to the floor, and I hope others will join me.”
Boxer, a California Democrat, has filed her legislation as an amendment to the Federal Aviation Administration reauthorization that’s on the Senate floor.
“Let me be very direct: Fatigue is a killer,” said Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger, whose successful 2009 water landing of a disabled US Airways jetliner in New York was dubbed the “Miracle on the Hudson.” “It’s a ruthless indiscriminate killer that our industry and our regulators have allowed to continue killing for way too long.”
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Article written by: By NANCY DILLON, NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Tom Hanks will play him in a Clint Eastwood-directed biopic due out this summer, but Chesley Sullenberger isn’t leaning his seat back.
The Miracle on the Hudson pilot was in Washington, D.C. Tuesday, pushing lawmakers to pass the Safe Skies Act and grant cargo pilots the same rest protections as passenger pilots.
“This is not a partisan issue, it’s a science-based, commonsense issue,” Sullenberger told the Daily News.
He said cargo pilots generally fly at night and deserve the same sleep standards already guaranteed to passenger pilots – flights limited to eight or nine hours and minimum 10-hour rest periods.
“It’s really just flat wrong (to exclude cargo pilots). They’re the ones who need it most. They have their natural circadian rhythms disrupted the most,” Sullenberger told The News.
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Article written by: SARAH D. WIRE, Los Angeles Times
Flanked by passenger plane and cargo plane pilots, including Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, U.S. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) on Tuesday urged her colleagues to set the same rest standards for pilots of both types of planes.
Prompted by Boxer-backed legislation, the Department of Transportation moved in 2009 to limit passenger plane pilots to either eight or nine hours in the air, depending on the start time, and require at least 10 hours of rest time before they fly again. But, cargo plane pilots were exempted from the rule and can fly up to 16 hours a day.
“They share the same skies, the planes [are] the same size, they fly over the same homes, so this makes absolutely no sense,” Boxer said at a Capitol Hill news conference.
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Radio interview with KNX 1070 Los Angeles speaking with Capt. Sullenberger on the topic of the Safe Skies Act.
Partial transcription:
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With help from Heather Caygle, Kathryn A. Wolfe and Tony Romm
HOLD YER HORSES: Maybe it’s premature to say that the AIRR Act is running out of steam. But here’s the truth: Even though Congress wasn’t even in session this week, it turned out to be a rough few days for the FAA reauthorization bill. Despite earlier hopes from some for a swift path to the House floor, the legislation will not be taken up by the House in the upcoming week, our Kathy Wolfe and Heather Caygle report. Instead, the House Transportation Committee is “still working with related committees,” a House leadership aide told Heather. From their story: “Lobbyists have grown increasingly skeptical about Shuster’s goal of having the bill on the House floor next week, and had begun signaling that they were expecting it to be shelved temporarily. The delay isn’t unexpected, considering that Democrats appear united against the bill, making it crucial for the GOP to maintain its ranks.” And T&I Chairman Bill Shuster’s plan to strip air traffic control away from the FAA hasn’t been helped by a steady stream of outside naysayers — such as The New York Times editorial board and Delta. And speaking of naysayers …
SULLY SPEAKS: Capt. Chesley Sullenberger, the celebrated pilot from “the Miracle on the Hudson,” spoke with MT about his views on the House Transportation Committee’s FAA overhaul bill — and he’s not happy. He worries that the creation of a nonprofit air traffic control system will create an unequal system that gives unparalleled power to commercial airlines and fails to protect general aviation and airline passengers.