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| Miracle on Hudson |
This news was also unusual because news is always a bad thing because not having an accident is not news. (That's why reading too much news leads to negativity. Whether it's mainstream media or social media, the desire to stay informed can lead to frustration).
On January 15, 2009, three days after the news broke, a plane flew from New York to Seattle. Just a minute and a half after takeoff, when the plane was four and a half miles from the airport, it collided with a flock of ducks. There were loud banging noises, flames from the engines and then silence. Both engines failed. The ship's captain called May Day. The captain was told to land on Runway 13. The captain guessed he would not be able to return. "We are about to descend into the river," the captain said.
Ninety seconds later, Captain Celine Burger landed the Hudson River. All 155 passengers were rescued alive.
The captain was credited with the incident and was called a Hudson miracle. But do they just explain superheroes or miracle events?
No doubt the captain showed extraordinary foresight and skill, but behind it was a history of decisions made by thousands of people over decades. It would not have been possible for them to survive without it. Their survival was the triumph of a vast network of human intelligence. Ideas shared, inventions of corporations, government funding, government regulations. Ignoring them makes the event look dramatic, but until we get to the bottom of the story, try not to look behind it, don't know where the progress comes from. How can this be done faster? It cannot be detected without understanding the whole background.
One aspect of his story is the gun that throws dead chickens. Birds are a threat to ships. This can cause the engine to fail. But failure is not just a word. It has its own ways. Stop the engine working? Or will it break? If it breaks, parts of it can cause structural damage, after which the wreckage can fly away within seconds. (Birds usually damage one engine and the plane can fly safely with another engine). While the invention of the gun was an innovation, so was the invention of the test and the regulation to make it mandatory was a step that made world air travel more secure.
Another aspect of such a safe design is that the engines have no contact with each other. Whether the engines are two, or three or four, they are very different, have their own control and the malfunction of one never affects the other. This is another security system for the ship. The collision of this flight with a large crowd in which both engines failed, is a very rare event.
Will a collision with birds damage the structure? It is tested at Arnold Air Force Base in Tennessee. A team of scientists and engineers use a helium gas pressure gun to fire dead chickens at high speed on a jet engine. This determines whether the engine will fail safely in the event of a bird strike. No engine model can be used commercially until it has passed this test. If there was no structural damage to Hudson's miracle ship despite the large number of birds that crashed, it was because of the design and passing tests. And these engines were so durable that the engine on the left was giving some power. It wasn't just luck.
(Many such tests are performed on the engine. Four and a half tons of water per minute. Cannon-throwing ice which is one and a half tons per minute. The engine has to pass all this).
The aircraft's electronic and hydraulic systems continued to operate throughout the flight. It was a fly-by-wire system dating back to 1972. It was designed by NASA engineers at the Dryden Flight Research Center. Digital computers and other state-of-the-art electronic devices provide pilot control of the aircraft. The work of NASA engineers began to be used in aircraft design in the 1980s. The Airbus A320 had a fly-by-wire system in 1987. (The Airbus A320 is considered the safest aircraft). Twenty-one years later, when Captain Sly was unloading his ship on the river, a silent companion was the system. This system was the essence of years of research and planning. William Langwish writes on this,
"When the captain turned left and turned the nose of the ship down and chose the gliding speed, the ship itself had calculated the exact speed and the green dot was visible on their screen. He was guiding the captain by calculating ten seconds ahead of what he should do. With the guidance of the yellow and green dots, the captain had to bring the side stick to a neutral position so that the angle of the nose of the ship would not change.
People who are not pilots generally assume that the mode of the aircraft is autopilot and a manual when the pilot is in control. Fly by wire is more sophisticated. Celine Burger was in control, but the system was working silently as well as guiding. Was helping to make the right choice. Steve Johnson writes: "It was a song sung by a man sitting on the seat of an extraordinary landing pilot and a system of thousands of human beings in a system made up of dirty knowledge."
Can Captain Sly manage to make this landing without this system? Fortunately for the 155 passengers on board, their fate did not depend on this question.
No one was killed in the crash. But many were injured. Four people had to spend more than two days in hospital. Some people needed medical attention because of hypothermia caused by spending time in the water at temperatures of minus seven degrees. Flight attendant Doreen Welsh lost a metal rod in his leg that prevented him from continuing his aviation career.
Although there were no casualties, there was a lengthy investigation. Even the behavior of Captain Sully, the great hero of the day, was scrutinized to see if his decision was correct. He was allowed to take the next flight only when it was proved that the decision was appropriate in this situation. The aircraft, emergency systems and regulations were reviewed in detail, and federal safety regulators released a 213-page investigative report on May 4, 2010, which contained several technical and safety improvements. How ships and engines can be better protected from bird strikes. Another recommendation was to look at Doreen Walsh's injury. Airbus has been asked to change the design of the vertical rod in smaller planes to reduce the risk of future injuries. (This report is public and anyone can view it. Link to report at the end).
Films were made on Hudson's miracle, stories were written. The record of the last two years has not been broken even on this day. The 155 people on board were lucky.
But is luck alone enough to explain their survival today?
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