Chesley B. Sullenberger

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Sullenberger 2010 at the Lions World Convention in Sydney
Airbus A320 ( Flight 1549 ) after Sullenberger's successful ditching in the Hudson River
Chesley B. Sullenberger (left), co-pilot Jeffrey B. Skiles (right) and Kentucky Senator Jim Bunning at the inauguration of Barack Obama on January 20, 2009

Chesley Burnett "Sully" Sullenberger III (born January 23, 1951 in Denison , Texas ) is an American pilot with over 20,000 hours of flight experience. He successfully ditched an Airbus A320 on US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson River in 2009 .

Life

Sullenberger studied at the US Air Force Academy , Purdue University and the University of Northern Colorado and was a fighter jet pilot ( F-4 Phantom II ) of the US Air Force , in 1980 he became a commercial pilot . He is also an active glider pilot . He was a safety officer and trainer for the Alpa pilots' association , an aircraft accident expert at the responsible traffic authority NTSB , a member of the national technical committee and has prepared numerous accident reports for the Air Force and American authorities. He informed the Alpa members about new findings in the area of ​​air traffic control and prepared hundreds of crew members in training courses for how to behave in emergencies. He also worked as an industrial safety advisor and was a visiting professor in disaster management at the University of California, Berkeley .

In the economically tense period for airlines after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 , his salary was reduced by 40%, his pension entitlements ended and, in his opinion, worthless promises replaced. In a hearing of the Aviation Subcommittee of the House of Representatives in February 2009, he also described this as a consequence of the deregulation that began in the 1970s. No pilot wants his children to take up this profession. Experienced crews are a thing of the past.

Sullenberger is considered a prudent pilot and, with over 20,000 flight hours, a very experienced pilot. He became known to a wider public after he ditched US Airways flight 1549 safely on the Hudson on January 15, 2009 , in the middle of the busy New York harbor . All 155 people on board survived the ditching, only a few suffered minor injuries from hypothermia. This was also the world's first water landing with an Airbus A320 . Thanks to the successful rescue of the passengers, Sullenberger received the attribute "Held vom Hudson" in the media. The ditching is considered a flying masterpiece, because Sullenberger and his crew - among them the copilot Jeffrey Skiles - had to make several decisions in a very short time and to master a highly unusual landing, both actions outside of the usual and possible pilot training. Sullenberger succeeded in only the third water landing of a jet without loss of people. He behaved in an exemplary manner even after the ditching; his cabin crew evacuated all passengers within minutes. Sullenberger himself went through the sinking plane twice to make absolutely sure that no one was on board and that he was the last to leave the plane .

The Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg , symbolically presented Sullenberger with a golden key to the City Hall of New York ("key to the city"), a recognition comparable to an honorary citizenship . The then US President George W. Bush and his successor Barack Obama thanked them by telephone for the flying performance. Sullenberger was also invited to Washington as a guest of honor for Obama's inauguration on January 20, 2009.

Eight months after the accident, on October 1st, Sullenberger took a seat in the cockpit of an A320 for the first time. He took off again from LaGuardia (New York), sitting at his side, as on January 15, was First Officer Jeffrey Skiles, and his air traffic controller at LaGuardia Airport was again Patrick Harten. Together they wanted to bring the flight that began at that time to a good end, said Sullenberger. On October 13, 2009, he published his book Highest Duty. My Search for What Really Matters (published in Germany on November 9, 2009 under the title You don't have to be a hero. What values ​​are important in life ), in which he describes his experiences from the Hudson River. On March 3, 2010, Sullenberger retired. Some Hudson ditch passengers also took part on his last flight. Also in 2010 Sullenberger received the officer's title of the French Legion of Honor .

Sullenberger is married and has two daughters. His ancestors emigrated from Wynigen in the canton of Bern (Switzerland) to the (present-day) USA in 1737 . The band College dedicated their song A Real Hero to Sullenberger , part of the soundtrack for the film Drive .

In 2016, director Clint Eastwood focused on the events surrounding the Hudson ditching in the film Sully , Sullenberger is played in the lead role by Tom Hanks .

On May 29, 2018, an asteroid was named after Chesley Sullenberger: (108496) Sullenberger .

Worked as an expert following flight US Airways 1549

According to Sullenberger, the accident on Air France flight 447 in June 2009 with a Boeing that uses classic control horns would have been less likely, as these are mechanically coupled and every control input from one pilot is therefore clearly visible to the other pilot .

As a result of two crashes of the Boeing 737 MAX 8 , Sullenberger was asked by American members of Congress to interpret the course of the crash. He expressed sharp criticism of the Federal Aviation Administration and Boeing regarding the use and approval of the software, which is believed to be the cause of the crashes.

literature

  • Chesley B. Sullenberger (Author), Jeffrey Zaslow (Arr.): You don't have to be a hero. What values ​​are important in life (“Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters”). Bertelsmann Verlag, Munich 2009, ISBN 978-3-570-10049-3 .
  • Laura Parker, William Prochnau: Emergency landing in the Hudson River. What happened on Flight 1549? Passengers and eyewitnesses reconstruct the sensational ditching of flight captain Sullenberger. MavenPress Verlag, 2011, ISBN 978-3-941719-02-6

Web links

Commons : Chesley Sullenberger  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Texas Department of Health: Grayson County Births 1951. (No longer available online.) USGenWeb Archives, archived from the original on October 3, 2009 ; Retrieved June 18, 2015 .
  2. ^ High Reliability Organizations ( Memento from January 23, 2009 in the Internet Archive )
  3. ↑ Self-presentation on the website of his own company ( Memento of the original from January 18, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / safetyreliability.com
  4. ^ Hearings: US Airways Flight 1549 Accident. Testimony By Capt. Chesley B Sullenberger III, US Airways, Inc. Written Testimony ( February 25, 2009 memento in the Internet Archive )
  5. ↑ sullysullenberger.com
  6. ↑ FOCUS.DE-News: The hero of the Hudson River
  7. ↑ FOCUS NEWS: The hero of the Hudson III
  8. ↑ Spiegel online: Flight expert on ditching: "That was a flying masterpiece"
  9. ↑ Advice to a Brave Pilot: Use That City Key Wisely , New York Times, February 9, 2009, accessed September 29, 2017.
  10. ↑ ZEIT ONLINE: Hudson Miracle: Salvage of the New York misfortune machine
  11. ^ ZEIT ONLINE: Obama's inauguration
  12. ^ "Sully" takes off again ( Memento from October 14, 2011 in the Internet Archive )
  13. ↑ Peter-Philipp Schmitt: hero against his will . In: FAZ of December 16, 2009
  14. ↑ TIMES ONLINE: Chesley 'Sully' Sullenberger, hero pilot who crashed into Hudson River, retires
  15. ^ The French Legion Of Honor Presents Chesley Sullenberger With The Officier Award.
  16. ^ New York plane crash pilot Chesley B. Sullenberger III: Committed to air safety
  17. ↑ The family with the emergency landing gene
  18. ↑ «More unlikely with Boeing». In: aeroTELEGRAPH. July 10, 2012, accessed June 22, 2019 .
  19. ^ Berner Zeitung, Tamedia Espace AG: The pilot who reads the riot act to Boeing . ISSN  1424-1021 ( bernerzeitung.ch [accessed on June 22, 2019]).
personal data
SURNAME Sullenberger, Chesley B.
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Sullenberger, Chesley Burnett III (full name); Sully (nickname)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American pilot
DATE OF BIRTH January 23, 1951
PLACE OF BIRTH Denison (Texas)