Franklin, Andrews, Kramer & Edelstein

[scion]

Safety recommendations unfulfilled 7 years after Flight 1549

AP By JOAN LOWY Sep. 15, 2016 3:27 AM EDT
https://goo.gl/FQSUrK

WASHINGTON (AP) — More than seven years after an airline captain saved 155 lives by ditching his crippled airliner in the Hudson River, now the basis of a new movie, most of the safety recommendations stemming from the accident haven't been carried out.

Of the 35 recommendations made by the National Transportation Safety Board in response to the incident involving US Airways Flight 1549, only six have been successfully completed, according to an Associated Press review of board records. Fourteen of the recommendations issued to the Federal Aviation Administration and its European counterpart, EASA, are marked by the NTSB as "closed-unacceptable." One has been withdrawn, and the rest remain unresolved.

The movie "Sully," which opened in theaters last week, celebrates how veteran pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger, played by Tom Hanks, along with his co-pilot, flight attendants, air traffic controllers, ferry boat operators and first responders did their jobs with professionalism and competence, averting a potential tragedy. The plane lost thrust in both engines after colliding with a flock of Canada geese shortly after takeoff from LaGuardia Airport in New York. No one died, and only five people were seriously injured.

"The FAA was very upset back then that we made any recommendations at all," recalled Tom Haueter, who was the NTSB's head of major accident investigations at the time. "They thought this was a success story."

But to investigators, the event turned up problems. "This could happen again and we want to make sure that if it does, there are some better safety measures in place," Haueter said.

Recommendations that got an "unacceptable" response deal with pilot training, directions for pilots facing the loss of power in both engines, equipping planes with life rafts and vests and making it easier for passengers to use them, among other issues.

The untold story of the "Miracle on the Hudson" was the part luck played in preventing catastrophe on that freezing afternoon in January 2009. The wind chill was 2 degrees and the water temperature was 41 degrees, raising the risk of "cold shock," a condition in which people lose the use of their arms and legs, usually drowning within 5 minutes.

It was sheer chance that the plane, an Airbus A320, was equipped with rafts, life vests and seat cushions that can be used for flotation. The equipment is only required on "extended overwater" flights, and not on Flight 1549's New York to Charlotte, North Carolina, route.

The NTSB recommended requiring life vests and flotation cushions on all planes, regardless of the route. But the FAA responded that it was leaving that up to the airlines.
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