Update: Video Re-enactment by Scene Systems.
It will take a year for the NTSB to do a full investigation of Flight 1549, and I’m sure many recommendations will be made about airport birds, ditching airliners and things we haven’t even thought of yet.
In the meantime, so far I’ve heard about 5 issues to ponder …
1) After looking at a few Google maps overlayed with Flightaware data for Flight 1549 that landed in the Hudson River, maybe it could have landed back at La Guardia, instead of in an icy river, if landing gear could be extended:

Flight 1549 Ground Track Google Mashup by Avweb
Another “Powered by Google” Map
FlightAware Live Flight Track Log (AWE1549)
La Guardia’s elevation is about 21′. The engines failed at about 3,200′. The best glide ratio for an airliner is between 12 and 20 to 1, depending on model and configuration.
It looks like range was not a problem, although one would have to look at a current New York sectional map to see what obstructions would be in various flight paths.
According to the sectional I found online, turning right after engine failure would have resulted in no obstructions.
ATC instructed the plane to turn left and the plane complied. I have a feeling from reading and listening to the transcript that more urgency doing a turnback would have resulted in a landing at LGA, if landing gear could be extended.
2) Dick Rutan made the following observation in a letter to avweb.com: “[All the major news outlets] missed the big story that there were not enough rafts. Remember the Titanic. Had this not been in the river, 80% of passengers would have died in the cold water. How many rafts? Enough for all the passengers? There were a few on a raft and the rest on the wing.”
I have heard that rafts have been removed from many airliners to save weight, hence fuel and operating costs.
3) Also, a news report on the web said the A320 “ditch switch” had not been activated, thus allowing more water than necessary to enter the plane.
4) Would it be possible to shroud the engines with a 1 cm grille with sharpened facing dividers to cube the incoming birds?
5) How does a complete engine failure due to birds on a twin affect ETOPS operations over an ocean? Could the engines be damaged on take-off, then suddenly fail at altitude?
METAR weather observations around that time (the event happened on Jan. 15, 2009 at 3:30 pm EST, which is 2030Z) are available for KJFK and KLGA.
METAR KJFK 151951Z 33010KT 10SM BKN034 BKN055 M07/M14 A3024 RMK AO2 SLP238 T10671144 METAR KLGA 151951Z 34013KT 10SM BKN035 M06/M14 A3022 RMK AO2 SLP234 T10611139
Random comments about Flight 1549 on another blog
wikipedia: Gimli Glider
wikipedia: US Airways Flight 1549
avweb: US Airways Ditching Fallout Hits American With Rafts
avweb: Flight 1549, The Online Game?
avweb: Radio transcript and audio
youtube: Radio Scanner of the first 5 mins of US Airways Flight 1549 crash in the Hudson River
cnn.com: Flight 1549 crew: Hudson landing still on our minds
AP: Sully: Sex life better after Hudson landing
(Disclaimer: I hold a FAA commercial airplane license and have flown many ocean flights around Hawaii and Florida, but do not have any airline experience.)


Before my trip to Bali, I decided to buy a Acer Aspire One ZG5 Netbook at Fry’s for $349+tax, and use that instead of my usual 15″ (and 5.5 pounds) notebook.

