Air traffic controller reflects on 10 years since 'Miracle on the Hudson'

[Music] take me back to that afternoon he were at work and it was just midway through your shift or actually is more towards the beginning in my shift and there was a normal day for a routine cactus 1549 took took off northbound it was light traffic that day I tried to turn westbound and that's when he told me you know he had birds less thrust in both engines and need to return back to LaGuardia and when you heard him say bird strike lost thrust I mean what goes through your mind at that point well obviously I mean he lost us in both engines so this is a serious emergency he sounded very calm which is a good thing but when you hear that the loss Oscar basically the plane became a glider so I knew that you know I was gonna have to act quickly to try to help him resolve this situation and is the onus all on you at that point since you had cleared that plane for takeoff you have to find the landing spot is that how it works was procedurally no procedurally when there is an emergency the pilot in command is basically in charge and you're there to help him out so whatever he tells me he needs I was gonna make available for him so he said lost thrust so what did you try to do or what did you do immediately I cleared runways at LaGuardia initially because that's where I thought he was going to try to go to I had final vector stop the arrivals because if he was going to come into runway 13 which is opting direction to runway 3-1 which is what we're landing you know we obviously can have a plane landing in both directions but yeah so that was the first thing and I stopped departures so that I could focus on the emergency okay were you panicking no not back then afterwards yes but during the emergency you know you just try to you suppress all the emotions and all you you try to work through the problem that's the important part and when you heard lost thrust and you know what that means yeah it's a glider what were you thinking realistically were the options could could you get back to LaGuardia would he land on the Grand Central Parkway I mean right yeah look Ward is hard enough to land yeah a regular day right true you actually don't think thoughts like that during them right say that that's what comes up afterwards during the emergency you just kind of just just try to assist what he needs you know you want to do 13 okay I'll make 13 available to you and then at that point our other air traffic controllers also trying to help you or you just make you're the one in charge at that point in that in the tower no people yeah everyone did rally around me and you hear if you listen to a tape see he'll hear the tower was working with people on the Hudson River trying to get you know helicopters to spot the airplane as he was going down in thoughts and I was working with LaGuardia towers working with Itamar tower my supervisor behind me sleep Marauder was right behind me helping me out Alda lumba was on final he was holding everyone so that you know the runways were available for them I had Arlene next to me who actually stopped the newark departures who were going eastbound so everyone did help everyone contributed a little bit and after you cleared the LaGuardia runways didn't slowly make a second transmission which was asking about Teterboro yeah yeah so basically as he was coming down I was trying to feel out what he needed from me like you know giving him the runway options and then he asked what about off we can't make what he said we can't make a little audio what about off the right side how about t2 our Airport so yeah well feel right size T borough do you want to go there and he said yes come to find out afterwards that he really he didn't really want to go there but he won the option of being able to go there if something changed you know he get partial thrust in an engine or something like that he want that option so I hit the line at Teterboro Airport and I left the line hot so they can hear like I coordinated to get him run away one at Teterboro I left the line hot so that they get here in real time what I was saying to the captain the advantage of that is that I wouldn't have to go back and forth disadvantages it's kind of hard to hear the pilot when the line is hot like that so when he said we can't we're gonna be in the Hudson I had a hard time hearing that not only because the line was hot but because those words were you know that that meant that it was over that there was nothing I could do to get him back to an airport at that point so I was kind of hard to accept and at that point were you still in work mode or did you have I was so reaction still in work mode for I think the visceral reaction didn't happen until I said radar contact lost that was the hard part and then what we ending I thought that you know that I saw the radar target disappear basically next to this city so I thought the worst you know I kind of envisioned the wingtip hit in the water the plane cartwheeling and there would be no survivors that's what I was thinking afterwards and how long until you knew that it had landed safely I mean the news report started in but not right away right and there was actually more like 45 minutes for me because I had a you know they got me off position I went out to a union office and I was preparing to make a statement into the major incident so you have to make a statement so it took about 45 minutes for someone to come down and say you know it looks like everyone survived would you think that way like for for a split second I thought my friend we came down and said that it looks like everyone survived I thought it was messing with me but then when I realized that he wasn't and like it was a tremendous relief yeah and then did you I know you were in the Union office for a while did you then go up and finally see it on TV or was Schulman could just see a picture on your phone I didn't oh there's 10 years ago I had an old school phobia um I didn't see it until I went home I didn't see it on the news until I went home and it was pretty remarkable part of me was watching it though and thinking like these people who could be dead so that was kind of hard to get used to you know it's a I don't want to say what we kind of got lucky everyone did their job and I'm just grateful that it turned out the way it did because the alternative would have been horrific and so then how did you cope with it after I mean it was a good outcome yeah but were you experiencing any kind of PTSD yeah definitely I definitely did up until this point in my career I felt like no matter what you threw at me I can get the plane back to the runway and for the first time in my life I had to realize that no matter you know sometimes things will happen that are out of your control and no matter what you do you can't change what's what's gonna happen and this literally was out of my control you know I read up all the runway space I could do that all the way from here down to Charlotte but it didn't matter you know okay was that was kind of hard to get used to you know it was like a new reality for me probably when you went back to work did you have a little yeah was Hardy oh yeah yeah for a long time yeah how could you what if this happens again or yeah that's exactly what I was thinking you know well what if it happens again and the outcome isn't good and on the issue of the bird strikes I mean that's not happened again for both engines right right yeah but is that something like when you go and to start your shift do you guys check how many flocks of birds are around a minute no that's not really a No yeah because there's really no way of us knowing we don't pick them up on the radar I guess at the tower they could see it because they could see out the windows but for us we just work to traffic and we'll get if we get reports of birds from pilots then we pass it on but other than that you know we don't think about it so you've never had just since then change or tell a plane don't take off yet or you know no wait to land because there's a ton of birds by LaGuardia right no we haven't had to do that okay and then just like this tell me about how you were saying you've all become friends I mean how often do you talk or what you know what's the relationship we we see each other once a year definitely but we also have like a Facebook group and some of the passengers actually text me when they're flying in and out of LaGuardia if they're little nervous cuz they want me to work their flight so I'll do that for them but yeah we've been come close we're like with a 15:49 family and give you your medal with us yes at the marathon the New York City Marathon I ran this year yeah he was at the finish line he gave me the medal was awesome and when you afterwards there was a lot of questioning of what happened including the Eco issue of birds at the airport very loud and you had a testified before Congress right yeah did did you feel like they were blaming you no not at all not even a little bit but that was an intimidating venue I must say testifying in front of Congress the one class that I dropped in college was public speaking because I was afraid to speak publicly and then my first time public speaking was testifying in front of Congress Wow it was very intimidating and now I'm doing any of you yes I could take that class again what I guess what would you like people to know about this whole experience I mean 10 years later you're speaking to us you can you know smile about it yeah oh yeah what's them to take away take away I guess I think that the the reason I think this really resonates with people is because this is such a great example of how in a time of crisis and emergency people come together and they work together and they get things done you got myself other air traffic controllers the pilot the copilot the flight attendants even the passengers you gotta give them credit - you had the ferry boat captains and you had NYPD all the first responders right cause everyone came together to help out in this emergency situation it would be nice if we could do that every day you know just regardless of party affiliations and all that stuff and we can come together and work together we can do it in a time of crisis so it'd be nice will you do it every day and the passengers that you've become friends with on the plane did they ever say to you what was happening on the plane I mean they were panicking yeah yeah yeah I've heard the source yeah everyone has a little bit different regulation which is interesting because you know obviously it was a traumatic experience for them can only do that so some excrete as being an orderly exit some describe its being chaotic I guess it depends on your perspective right and what about Sully as a pilot I'm sure you have the utmost respect for him oh yeah as a friend mm-hmm tell me about him as he became this like national hero yeah what did he think of that what do you think of that he's he's great dude he really is he's just a good person obviously very professional pilot and but he has a good heart also I would you think of the movie that was made about it was it accurate fair yeah the movie was very good I thought it was very well done they kind of demonize the NTSB a little bit which me every Hollywood so that you need a you need a villain so they made the NTSB I that might have been a little bit of a stretch but but other than that it was very very well done and tell me about today you're flying down and mm-hmm you know why you chose the time they've chose yep we were flying down the show today we're gonna be on the same timeslot as the cactus 1549 flight the American lots of flight so we're gonna be I'm gonna have be on board with a couple passengers that were on that flight and it's gonna be a little surreal you know yeah I was gonna say so why why put yourselves through that if you will like your you do I don't know it's kind of like you know remembering you know and I mean it's nostalgic almost wait ten years afterwards so do you think you'll have a twenty year I hope so yeah that would be great Miracle on the Hudson does that fit is that fair yes and now I'm gonna say yes because I feel like all the right people are in the right places at the right time no because it wasn't a miracle it was everyone doing their job correctly that day

Channel: News 12

Views: 73,996

Keywords: news, news12, Miracle on the Hudson, hudson river, new york, journalisn, broadcast, airplane, LaGuardia Airport

Id: iJB-cU8Y8PY

Length: 13min 30sec (810 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 16 2019