In promotional clips for the movie “Sully,” which portrays the so-called Miracle on the Hudson water landing of a jetliner in 2009, there is little doubt about who the villains are: the accident investigators hounding the pilot after his splashdown.
That’s news to the actual investigators at the U.S. National Transportation Safety Board, who gave Captain Chesley Sullenberger high marks in their accident report and credited his quick action that saved lives.
“I think we’re getting the dirty end of the stick here,” said Robert Benzon, a 27-year NTSB veteran who oversaw the investigation before retiring in 2012. “From what I hear, this is somewhere between ‘Sharknado 2’ and ‘Sharknado 3.’ I just hope it isn’t as bad as everyone is telling me it is.”
Not only did the safety board investigators treat Sullenberger respectfully, they took great pains to carefully couch language in the final report so that it didn’t seem critical of a national hero, according to Benzon.
‘Highest Probability’
“The NTSB concludes that the captain’s decision to ditch on the Hudson River rather than attempting to land at an airport provided the highest probability that the accident would be survivable,” the report concluded.
The Jan. 15, 2009, water landing was a most improbable ending to a 208-second emergency. After a flock of geese severely damaged both engines on the Airbus Group SE A320 shortly after it took off from LaGuardia Airport in New York, Sullenberger and copilot Jeffrey Skiles ditched the US Airways plane on the Hudson River.
Despite frigid temperatures and damage to the plane’s undercarriage, only five of the 155 people aboard suffered serious injuries. No one died. Sullenberger, known instantly across the country by his nickname Sully, became an icon.
The movie, which opens in theaters on Friday, was directed by Clint Eastwood and stars Tom Hanks as Sullenberger. It is labeled "based on a true story."
“Until I read the script, I didn’t know the investigative board was trying to paint the picture that he had done the wrong thing,” Eastwood said in a video on the Warner Bros. website. “They were kind of railroading him into, it was his fault. And that wasn’t the case at all.”