US Airways Flt 1549 Crashed in Hudson River

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In summary, a US Airways plane carrying 155 people crashed into the Hudson River after striking one or more birds, causing the two engines to fail. The pilot successfully landed the plane in the river and all passengers and crew were rescued with no reported deaths or serious injuries. It is believed that the birds involved were seagulls or geese, and the extreme cold weather may have caused them to fly further south than usual. The fact that the plane was able to stay intact and upright in the river is a testament to the pilot's skill and the aircraft's robustness. Many people are grateful to the pilot and some credit God for the successful outcome.
  • #36
My only objection is the notion that we need an explanation for how a seatbelt works.
 
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  • #37
chemisttree said:
Ouch! A marketing man's nightmare!
Am I allowed to post it ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqjzJMAp8N4
 
  • #38
mgb_phys said:
It looks like it wasn't all thanks to God as the media claim.
The A320 is designed to make water landing a little more survivable. According to the aviation safety network there is a DITCH button in the cockpit which seals all the inlets making the plane float much higher in the water for longer. In addition the wheel bays seal water tight (unlike the exposed wheels of a 737) and the engines are designed to shear off in a no-wheels landing - which they did.

What you didn't know is that God designed the plane.

Good thing there was no ice in the river; no cross winds; a calm river on which to land... But I think the credit is given where due. I had heard about the design in a number of stories. Also, the pilot, copilot, and crew, have all been praised time and time again. The pilot even has a fan club now.

US Airways pilot Chesley Sullenberger gets FaceBook fan club!
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/thedishrag/2009/01/us-airways-pilo.html

Something else that I think is worthy of mention is that the passengers remained calm and acted quickly. The entire story is a textbook example of everything going right; less the fact that God threw birds at the plane.
 
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  • #39
Ivan Seeking said:
less the fact that God threw birds at the plane.
Maybe God hates birds ?
 
  • #40
mgb_phys said:
Maybe God hates birds ?

According to my buddies at Boeing, God hates Airbus. He works for Boeing now.
 
  • #41
Ivan Seeking said:
What you didn't know is that God designed the plane.

Good thing there was no ice in the river; no cross winds; a calm river on which to land...

Good thing they landed close to the part of the river where ferries crossed back and forth and could respond quickly. Good thing they didn't hit one of the ferries.
 
  • #42
I estimated the first A380 would go down around this time. Anyone want to wager the next one? I say 8 months.
 
  • #43
Denton said:
I estimated the first A380 would go down around this time. Anyone want to wager the next one? I say 8 months.

Well, it didn't go down due to technical problems (in the sense of design error). It's also not an A380 (or even an airbus).

I'm curious as to why you would think one would have a problem so soon? Do you question the ability of engineers?
 
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  • #44
You would need a very large flock of birds to takeout all 4 engines on an A380 - they are quite a long way apart.
 
  • #45
Cyrus said:
(or even an airbus).

Eh?
 
  • #46
That's an Embrayer or Bombarier.

Edit: Looking at the cockpit window layout, you're right.

The two companies basically make the exact same plane.
 
  • #47
Boy is my face red. Glared over the words and saw 'airplane' and A3-something.

I'm curious as to why you would think one would have a problem so soon? Do you question the ability of engineers?

Big plane. They were pushed over their budgets and time limits. Also I'm a bit of a pessimist.

You would need a very large flock of birds to takeout all 4 engines on an A380 - they are quite a long way apart.

Terrorists train homing pigeons to fly into the engines. We don't stand a chance!
 
  • #48
Denton said:
They were pushed over their budgets and time limits.
Ever known an engineering project that wasn't?
The A380 was a lot less rushed than the 747.

I don't know if it's just small number stats, the fact that they are sold to big name airlines or real engineering advances but the newest aircraft models have had a pretty lucky run.
The only 777 oops was the fuel problem on the one at Heathrow, there haven't been any splats of the new 600-900 version 737s
 
  • #50
edward said:
From wiki



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bird_strike

I guess the engines safely shut down. Sometimes they disintegrate.
According FAR's, the test is that we have to be at at least 100% T.O. power. Once the ingestion takes place, there can be no modification to the throttle for at least 15 seconds. After that there are three basic things that have to be demonstrated: The engine can be safely shut down, there are no debris thrown from the engine and no fire is produced.

The size of the birds to test with is a function of the fan diameter.

If an engine disintegrates during a test, there is no certification.
 
  • #51
FredGarvin said:
The size of the birds to test with is a function of the fan diameter.

If an engine disintegrates during a test, there is no certification.

The size of the bird that hits an engine is not neccesarily going to be the size that the engine was tested with.
 
  • #52
edward said:
The size of the bird that hits an engine is not neccesarily going to be the size that the engine was tested with.
That's true, but the size is usually pretty close as to what would be probable (the FAA put some work into that size requirement). There's nothing saying that an Emu wouldn't cross the runway on takeoff roll though.
 
  • #54
Security cam video of crash and rescue - doesn't capture the crash real well, but then zooms in for the rescue (start at about 2 min): http://www.ireport.com/docs/DOC-183256
 
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  • #55
Watch the right wing tip, around 3:10.
 
  • #56
Sorry, I got a little spyware/malware attack and deleted the link temporarily until others could check it out. It wasn't the source...
 
  • #58
Andre said:
From http://imnotsayin.blogspot.com/2009/01/us-airways-fight-1594-crash-flight-path.html

This looks very weird, also if you'd plot the energy of the aircraft. Something is not right there, unless the error margin of the data is large. Hence it's highly premature to speculate what happened exactly and whether or not everybody took the correct decisions.


I vaguely remember my PPL engine out test, the instructor shuts the throttle, and the trainee has to pick a spot to land and demonstrate that he/she can find a spot and pull off a landing, from what i can remember it is not at all easy, the instructor has all ready selected a landing spot before he shuts the throttle, and he is on the opposite side of the aircraft, any way i passed the test, but with comments from the instructor like , why did you go for that
landing site rather than this much better one, i think i said, i saw a possible place and went for it.
When an aircraft is over populated areas it must be a nightmare to make a split second decision, and these guys do not have quantum computers to tell them what do in X amount of seconds.
 
  • #59
Could you be a little more specific? Besides the plane crash, I don't see anything that looks weird to me.
 
  • #60
The aircraft gained energy in minute 3:29 from about 8341*m to 8500*m, suggesting that it had enough power at that time to maintain level flight (wind depending).
 
  • #61
From the description vertical resolution is 100 ft, so both 1200 and 1300 can be in fact almost the same height.
 
  • #62
True but it is still a remarkable reduction of the bleeding of total energy within the error margin:

v h E (0,5*(v/2)^2+10*h/3,3)
151 1800 8305
174 2800 12269
194 3200 14401
202 2000 11161
215 1600 10627
194 1200 8341
191 1300 8500
189 400 5677
153 300 3835

Especially since the turn itself also costs energy
 
  • #63
Why (v/2)^2?
 
  • #64
Borek said:
Why (v/2)^2?

Old mental dead reckoning. From knots to M/sec is very close to 0.5
 
  • #65
Don't we love those conversion tricks :smile:
 
  • #66
Bravo to the ferry driver who got to the area first.
 
  • #67
Dunno - when the error in the altitude is known to be +-8% and you calculate a 2% increase in energy, that doesn't seem to me to be very strange at all. You're well inside the error margin of the calculation.
 
  • #68
the energy should have dropped way more in that time frame, the altitude should have been around 900 feet for a normal glide.
 
  • #69
thechicgeek said:
He even has a cool name "sully"... sounds like something from Miami Vice. LOL

Or from "Monsters, Inc." I can't get rid of the mental image of a big blue fuzzy monster sitting at the controls of an airplane. :eek:
 
  • #70
Another reason not to fly on an airbus. They have been having some pretty scary crashes due to computer related problems. Something about the computers thinking the plane is landing and not allowing the pilot to increase throttle input.
 

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