Highest Duty

THE CABIN was very quiet. A few people made phone calls or sent text messages to their loved ones. I’m told some were saying their prayers. Others would say they were making peace with the situation. If they were going to die, they said, there was nothing they could do about it, and so they tried to accept it.

Some of the passengers later told me that they were glad I didn’t give them too many details. That would have made them even more frightened.

It wasn’t until about ninety seconds before we hit the water that I spoke to the passengers.

I wanted to be very direct. I didn’t want to sound agitated or alarmed. I wanted to sound professional.

“This is the captain. Brace for impact!”

I knew I had to make an announcement to the passengers to brace. We’re taught to use that word. “Brace!” Saying it not only can help protect passengers from injury on touchdown, but it is also a signal to the flight attendants to begin shouting their commands. Even in the intensity of the moment, I knew I had to choose my words very carefully. There was no time to give the flight attendants a more complete picture of the situation we faced. So my first priority was to prevent passenger injury on impact. I did not yet know how well I’d be able to cushion the touchdown. I said “brace” and then chose the word “impact” because I wanted passengers to be prepared for what might be a hard landing.

The flight attendants—Sheila, Donna, and Doreen—immediately fell back on their training. All the cockpit doors have been hardened since the September 11 attacks, so it’s more difficult to hear what’s going on in the cabin. Still, through that thicker door, I could hear Donna and Sheila, who were up front, shouting their commands in response to my announcement, almost in unison, again and again: “Brace, brace! Heads down! Stay down! Brace, brace! Heads down! Stay down!”

As I guided the plane toward the river, hearing their words comforted and encouraged me. Knowing that the flight attendants were doing exactly what they were supposed to do meant that we were on the same page. I knew then that if I could deliver the aircraft to the surface intact, Donna, Doreen, and Sheila would get the passengers out the exit doors and the rescue could begin. Their direction and professionalism would be keys to our survival, and I had faith in them.

From the cockpit voice recorder:

Sullenberger (3:29:45): “OK, let’s go put the flaps out, put the flaps out…”

Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System synthetic voice (3:29:55): “Pull up. Pull up. Pull up. Pull up. Pull up. Pull up.”

Skiles (3:30:01): “Got flaps out!”

Skiles (3:30:03): “Two hundred fifty feet in the air.”

The plane continued to descend, and it was as if the bluffs along the Hudson and the skyscrapers on both sides of the shoreline had come up to meet us. As Jeff would later describe it: “It felt as if we were sinking into a bathtub.” The river below us looked cold.

Ground Proximity Warning System synthetic voice (3:30:04): “Too low. Terrain.”

Ground Proximity Warning System (3:30:06): “Too low. Gear.”

Skiles (3:30:06): “Hundred and seventy knots.”

Skiles (3:30:09): “Got no power on either one. Try the other one.”

Radio from another plane (3:30:09): “Two one zero, uh, forty-seven eighteen. I think he said he’s goin’ in the Hudson.”

Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System synthetic voice (3:30:15): “Caution, terrain!”

Skiles (3:30:16): “Hundred and fifty knots.”

Skiles (3:30:17): “Got flaps two, you want more?”

Sullenberger (3:30:19): “No, let’s stay at two.”

Sullenberger (3:30:21): “Got any ideas?”

Skiles (3:30:23): “Actually, not.”

Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System synthetic voice (3:30:23): “Caution, terrain.”

Enhanced Ground Proximity Warning System synthetic voice (3:30:24): “Terrain, terrain. Pull up. Pull up.” [“Pull up” repeats until the end of the recording.]

Sullenberger (3:30:38): “We’re gonna brace!”

I did not think I was going to die. Based on my experience, I was confident that I could make an emergency water landing that was survivable. That confidence was stronger than any fear.

Lorrie, Kate, and Kelly did not come into my head, either. I think that was for the best. It was vital that I be focused, and that I allow myself no distractions. My consciousness existed solely to control the flight path.

As we came in for a landing, without thrust, the only control I had over our vertical path was pitch—raising or lowering the nose of the plane. My goal was to maintain a pitch attitude that would give the proper glide speed. In essence, I was using the earth’s gravity to provide the forward motion of the aircraft, slicing the wings through the air to create lift.

My flight instruments were still powered. I could see the airspeed indication. If I was slower than I needed to be, I slightly lowered the nose. If I felt we were going too fast, I raised the nose.

As a fly-by-wire airplane, the Airbus has some flight envelope protections, which means the flight control computers interpret the pilot’s sidestick inputs. Unlike more conventional aircraft, the Airbus does not provide the pilot with natural cues or “feel” that speed is changing, which would normally help the pilot maintain constant speed. But one of the fly-by-wire protections when flying at low speeds is that regardless of how hard the pilot pulls back on the sidestick, the flight control computers will not allow him to stall the wings and lose lift.

Compared with a normal landing, our rate of descent was much greater, since we had no engine thrust. Our landing gear was up, and I tried to keep the wings level to avoid cartwheeling when we hit the water. I kept the nose up.

My focus had narrowed as we descended, and now I was looking in only two places: the view of the river directly ahead and, inside the cockpit, the airspeed display on my instruments. Outside-inside-outside-inside.

It was only about three minutes since the bird strike, and the earth and the river were rushing toward us. I was judging the descent rate and our altitude visually. At that instant, I judged it was the right time. I began the flare for landing. I pulled the sidestick back, farther back, finally full aft, and held it there as we touched the water.

We landed and slid along the surface in a slightly nose-up attitude. The rear of the plane hit much harder than the front. Those in the back felt a violent impact. Those in front felt it as more of a hard landing.

We slowed down, leveled out, and then came to a stop as the river water splashed over the cockpit windows. I would later learn that I had achieved most of the parameters I attempted: The plane had landed with the nose at 9.8 degrees above the horizon, the wings were exactly level, and we were flying at 125.2 knots, just above the minimum speed for that configuration. The rate of descent, however, even with full aft stick commanding full nose up, could not be arrested as much as I would have liked.

Within a second or two, we returned to the slightly nose-up attitude and the plane was floating. The skyline of New York presented itself from sea level.

Jeff and I turned to each other and, almost in unison, said the same thing.

“That wasn’t as bad as I thought.”

Still, we knew that the hardest part of this emergency might still be ahead. There were 155 passengers and crew members on a plane that might soon be sinking.