US Air flight 1549 Crash lands in water - due to bird strike. ALL survive.
News reports showing an Airbus A320 that flew out of New York's LaGuardia sinking in Hudson River. Good news, if there is such a thing: Airframe appears very intact and was floating on the water for a good amount of time. Lots of ferries and helicopters there - pictures of people on the wings.
TV reports say 146 passengers and 5 crew. Flight was en route to Charlotte and pilot reported hitting a "flock of geese" sources are saying - if he suffered birdstrikes on both engines, very likely to have to ditch the plane.
We don't know a lot: how quickly rescue boats and helicopters arrived and whether or not people on board were able to get out. From the looks of the TV pictures, they got a lot of boats and helicopters there.
Here's more gathered from wire services:
Joyce Cordero, a 60 Minutes producer who saw the airplane go down in the river, said she saw flotation devices open up as she watched with binoculars.
"We saw a few dozen people on the actual aircraft wing," she said on WABC-TV in New York, monitored over the Internet. "They made it out. Within a few minutes, we saw some rescue boats head over and help folks. In the next 15 minutes, it became a movie-like scene."
- No indications of terrorism activity.
One interesting note: The Hudson is on the other side of Manhattan from where this plane took off. That might suggest that they had to struggle with this aircraft OVER Manhattan, which would have been a potentially disastrous outcome.
Maybe the greatest job of flying a damaged aircraft since Souix City Iowa crash, where the plane had no hydraulic control? The pictures suggest the entire airframe is intact, which would give a really good chance of people getting off that plane OK.
Gov't officials now telling MSNBC that both engines got hit with birdstrikes.
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Originally Posted by Dracc
