Dating in New York can seem like rolling a pair of dice directly into a venomous snake's mouth. In fact, the easiest way to find a significant other in this city is probably surviving a plane crash with them.
Photographer Stephen Mallon had exclusive access to the salvage operation that pulled Sully-piloted US Airways Flight 1549 out of the Hudson River. Now that he's erased all "US Airways" logos, he can show his pictures!
HarperCollins will pay $3.2 million for two books from pilot Chesley Sullenberger, according to a story in the Daily Beast. And go figure: the Zen-calm "Hero of the Hudson" is a poet.
The saintly hero-pilot of Flight 1549 has at last looked to cash in on his heroism! Thank goodness. Waiting for Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger to drop this shoe was killing us.
On 60 Minutes, Katie Couric kept asking Chesley Sullenberger whether his heroic flight was influenced by anything beside training: his gut, his terror, his God. No: "I was sure I could do it."
After promising himself to CBS, pilot Chesley Sullenberger gave an interview to ESPN. Katie Couric should have known. "Sully" may be dreamy, and is definitely a hero, but he's also a media heartbreaker.
Cockpit recorders on US Airways Flight 1549 indicate both engines failed at 3,200 feet, soon after takeoff, federal officials said. The crew was reportedly very collected, including the flight attendants, now official heroes.
"Hero of the Hudson" this, "Pilot Saved Them All" that. Did everyone around here forget the co-pilot usually has the harder job in a crash-landing?
The plane comes down into the water right around the two minute mark and it's very grainy. But that blur of silver does give you a sense of just how smoothly Chelsey B. Sullenberger III was able to touch down. The rest shows the first minutes of passengers exiting onto the wings and the first ferry boat arriving to their rescue. Given that the US Airways flight went down in one of the most densely populated places on earth under virtual police-state surveillance, we actually expected more footage than this to come out. [Update As commenter Claire Buoyant points out, the BBC has clips from two other angles.] Still, this will do for now.
Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger, III was the last person to leave US Airways Flight 1549 — a true captain, he swept the center aisle twice to ensure no one else was still on board.
News of the emergency landing of US Airways Flight 1549 began as another grim disaster. But with those aboard quickly delivered from the freezing Hudson waters, this was, improbably, the crash with a happy ending.
