Some Thoughts Regarding Captain Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger's Water Landing

US Airways Captain Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger III

US Airways Flight 1549

Soap Box Ravings has heard many people calling various talk shows who have a tendency to disregard the pilot's actions in landing his aircraft on the Hudson River. Their reasoning is since pilots "train" for emergencies; this wet landing is not such a big deal.

I can only assume these are the same kind of people who assume their personal protection is in the hands of the local on-duty police officer.

That pilot may have read a lot of aircraft technical manuals, he may have flown a lot of hours in a Link, or similar trainer, but to the best of my knowledge, no pilot lands "wheels up" in water with an actual aircraft regardless of the amount of training they are subject to.

That was most assuredly his first wet landing in a wheels up airliner full of passengers.

In Soap Box Ravings' opinion, the only people that have have landed their aircraft wheels up in the water and lived to talk about are referred to as survivors.

For those who think trained people standby for their protection think about this, both business and government have a tendency to reduce personnel training when money is tight such as it is now.

In addition to reduced or eliminated training, remember every training class has some people who are less skilled than others. In other words, an anchor man or woman. The word training can mean at lot less than you may think. Some organizations feel that providing a technical manual is training.

Also, let us not forget that trained skills are perishable; they need to be continually used or they are lost.