Nearly everyone has described the event as a Miracle. I did a quick bit of poking around to see if any credit had been attributed to the ONLY one who can perform miracles. Unfortunately, Captain Sullenberger didn't seem willing to do that.
I received this picture, which I believe gives credit, where credit is due!
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I'm not entirely convinced that the safe ditching of USAirways flight 1549 after a suicide attack by hostile B-1RDs (evidence is mounting for Canadian involvement) is "miraculous". If so, The Big Guy heavily stacked the deck in His favor well beforehand.
Captain Sullenberger has been a licensed pilot since age 14. He graduated near the top of his high school class. The year he graduated from the Air Force Academy he was given the Outstanding Cadet in Airmanship Award. He flew F-4s and worked as his unit's training officer and served on accident investigation boards. He went straight from military service to flying for US Airways (in 1980). In 2007, he started his own safety consulting business. While with US Airways, he has been heavily involved in accident investigation and safety for the Airline Pilots Association. He has more than 19,000 hours flight time on Airbus A320s (the same model as Flight 1549). You would be hard-pressed to find a more qualified pilot anywhere to land an unpowered commercial jet on water.
Because both engines were knocked out and the plane never got over 3200 ft, there wasn't enough energy available to either return to LaGuardia or divert to Teterboro. The only option left was to ditch in the Hudson at the most prepared stretch of water in the US for a water recovery (close to the USS Intrepid Museum). Since 2001, NYC has made plans for handling emergencies on the Hudson River. All ferries and other commercial watercraft are trained as first responders. In fact, the first boat pulled up alongside Flight 1549 less than 4 minutes after landing. The NYC public emergency system (including FDNY) issued an All Hands alert moments later to get max resources onsite as quickly as possible. The cabin crew also did an outstanding job evacuating the plane quickly and safely.
The point of all this? Most accidents are a recital of all the things that had to go wrong before something Really Bad happened; this one will be a textbook case for years on how well-trained people (flight crew, cabin crew, first responders, air traffic controllers, emergency dispatchers) working as a team, can do what seems impossible (or miraculous). In some circles (US Special Operations forces, British SAS, New York Yankees) these results aren't surprising, they're expected.
It was not time for these 155 people to leave us. The miracle is He got all these outstanding people in the right place at the right time to do all the right things and save lives.
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