11–20 of 75 posts
I'd never read about this flight before. Thanks for the share. Tragic about the loss of life.
His work eventually resulted in a Nobel prize for the scientists who built upon it.
He didn’t survive the crash.
With all the attention given to the 737 MAX lately, it's easy to forget that airline travel is dramatically safer today than it was just 30 years ago when this incident took place. Fatalities per revenue passenger-mile have decreased by a factor of 15x from 1989 to 2018 (and 54x from 1970 to 2018) [1]. [1] https://theblogbyjavier.com/2019/01/02/aviation-safety-evolu...
With all the attention given to the 737 MAX lately, it's easy to forget that airline travel is dramatically safer today than it was just 30 years ago when this incident took place. Fatalities per revenue passenger-mile have decreased by a factor of 15x from 1989 to 2018 (and 54x from 1970 to 2018) [1]. [1] https://theblogbyjavier.com/2019/01/02/aviation-safety-evolu...
I heard Al Haynes speak in a small group setting regarding this incident when I was in aviation college. The amount of composure they had to maintain to even get this aircraft near an airport was unbelievable.
Between the four pilots they had nearly 90,000 hours of flight time. Haynes had 30,000, of which ~7,200 where on type. Records had 20,000, Dvorak 15,000 and Fitch had 23,000. Fitch had amazingly practiced flying in a simulator with throttles-only after hearing about JAL 123. If any crew was going to land this plane, it was this one.
I wonder why they didn't "dump the fuel" just before the crash to have avoided the fire. I thought this was standard operating procedure to dump fuel before crash landings.
I had read about the crash awhile ago and as I recall many people that died died of smoke inhalation from the fire and not the impact itself.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Between the four pilots they had nearly 90,000 hours of flight time. Haynes had 30,000, of which ~7,200 where on type. Records had 20,000, Dvorak 15,000 and Fitch had 23,000. Fitch had amazingly practiced flying in a simulator with throttles-only after hearing about JAL 123. If any crew was going to land this plane, it was this one.
Amazing how that turns out. Like when Sulley had to ditch that flight into the Hudson, and just so happened to be an instructor of water landings. What are the odds?
"One way of looking at this might be that, for 42 years, I've been making small regular deposits in this bank of experience: education and training," said US Airways Capt. Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger. "And on January 15, the balance was sufficient so that I could make a very large withdrawal."
Absolute legend.
Was there ever any thought as to whether that contributed to the loss of life?