Another day, another reminder that "Sully" is better than you and me

Someone sent me this link to an article in eTurboNews, a self-described purveyor of "global travel industry news." Featured in the piece was First Officer Susan O'Donnell, a pilot who was on flight in one of the "jump seats," industry lingo for an open seat taken by an employee of the airline (I only know this through my extensive and sordid personal history with stewardesses, but I digress.) If you're anything like me, you've probably just about reached your threshold of "Miracle on the Hudson" stories. This, however, was somewhat interesting...

After introducing myself to and being welcomed aboard by Captain Sullenberger and FO Skiles, I was offered seat 3D, an aisle seat in the last row of First Class. I was in my uniform. Another jumpseat rider took a seat in row 6. These were the last empty seats on the airplane. I wasn't paying much attention to the flight until, climbing out, there were several loud thumps occurring roughly simultaneously along both sides of the aircraft. "Bird strikes," I thought. A few seconds later, there was a bit of smoke and the stench of burning bird that seemed to confirm my guess. There was a turn to the left, and I assumed we were returning to LGA.

The passengers were concerned but calm. I couldn't see any part of the aircraft out the window from my aisle seat. Although I didn't hear much that sounded encouraging from the engines, I expected we would have at least partial thrust with which to limp back to LGA. We rolled out of the turn, and I could tell we were not maintaining altitude. Then we heard the PA: "This is the Captain. Brace for impact."

First Officer O'Donnell then goes on to describe the landing and evacuation, which didn't really shed any new light on anything new, but then she delves into what happened after they all reached dry land, and this is what I found really interesting...

Once at the terminal, we were met by police, firemen, paramedics, FBI, Homeland Security, the Red Cross, Mayor Bloomberg, and more. Captain Sullenberger continued in a leadership role in the aftermath, talking with the passengers, assembling his crew and including myself and the other jumpseat rider as members of his crew. I was impressed to note that he had the aircraft logbook tucked under his arm. When the Captain asked me if I wanted to join the crew at the hotel, I told him I would really appreciate it as I had lost my wallet. He immediately pulled out his wallet and gave me $20. His concern for me when he had so much else to worry about was amazing.

So after safely landing the plane in the river and evacuating everyone on board in an orderly manner, Sully was going around passing out cash from his own wallet to the flight's passengers?! AND he remembered to grab his handy-dandy logbook?!?! For fuck's sake, Sully is like Jesus Christ, Martin Luther King and The Green Lantern all rolled into one or something. Dude is unreal!

And oh...the audio of the recovered cockpit voice recording was released today. Listen to Jesus Christ Martin Luther King Green Lantern Sullerberger calmly handle the situation, all the way down his final words..."we're going in the Hudson."