Chesley Sullenberger airplane pilot, known as “Sully” the pilot of the US Airways Flight 1549 that crashed into the Hudson River is being celebrated as a hero for a great successfully landing the plane without any major injuries or fatalities.

Another thing is about Chesley Sullenberger pilot that he is a former Air Force fighter pilot. And now for his actions “Sully” was celebrated by New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg, who hailed Sullenberger’s actions as “masterful,” reports The Daily Telegraph:

But he heaped praise on the plane’s captain, pilot Chesley B. Sullenberger – a 29-year veteran known as “Sully” to his colleagues – for landing the plane flat on the water and avoiding nearby Manhattan.

Mayor Bloomberg said happily that he had spoken to Mr Sullenberger at length, and said he did a ” real masterful job”.

Sullenberger searched the plane before exiting the plane, reports ABCNews.com:

The hero of Flight 1549, pilot Chesley B. Sullenberger III, walked the aisle of the downed US Airways jet twice looking for passengers before exiting the plane he safely ditched in the Hudson River, saving the lives of more than 150 people onboard.

The successful landing on water is a real rare and lucky case, reports the NY Daily News:

It appeared to be the first time in 45 years that a major aircraft crash-landed in the water – and every passenger on board made it out alive.

The Wall Street Journal is celebrating even more Chesley Sullenberger in its description of the case:

For the first time in 50 years of commercial jet flight, the pilots of US Airways Flight 1549 successfully executed one of the most technically challenging maneuvers, landing a jetliner on water without fatalities.

Many of other pilots were not surprised at all on  Sullenberger’s decisive action under intense pressure, reports the Wall Street Journal:

Rick Kurner, also a US Airways airplane pilot, says he has flown with Sully for 23 years. “He’s always been an unbelievable professional,” says Mr. Kurner, a first officer.

Mr. Kurner says when he heard it was Capt. Sullenberger who was flying the plane that landed safely in the Hudson, he wasn’t at all surprised. “He held his cool. ‘Where am I going to go? City? City? River.’”

CNN spoke to Sullenberger’s wife, Lori, who was stunned by her husband’s ordeal:

Sullenberger’s wife told CNN she spoke to her husband and is reeling from the incident.

“I was stunned. I hadn’t been watching the news. I’ve heard Sully say to people, ‘It’s rare for an airline pilot to have an incident in their career,’ ” Lori Sullenberger said.
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“When he called me he said, ‘There’s been an accident.’ At first I thought it was something minor, but then he told me the circumstances and my body started shaking and I rushed to get our daughters out of school.”

Take a look at Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger’s bio, as it can be read on the website of his company, Safety Reliability Methods, Inc.

Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger, III is a captain for a major U.S. airline with over 40 years of flying experience. A former U.S. Air Force (USAF) fighter pilot, he has served as an instructor and Air Line Pilots Association (ALPA) safety chairman, accident investigator and national technical committee member. He has participated in several USAF and National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) accident investigations. His ALPA safety work led to the development of a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Advisory Circular. Working with National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) scientists, he coauthored a paper on error inducing contexts in aviation. He was instrumental in the development and implementation of the Crew Resource Management (CRM) course used at his airline and has taught the course to hundreds of his colleagues. Sully is a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy (B.S.), Purdue University (M.S.) and the University of Northern Colorado (M.A.). He was a speaker on two panels at the High Reliability Organizations (HRO) 2007 International Conference in Deauville, France May 29-31, 2007. He has just been named a Visiting Scholar at the University of California, Berkeley.

Sullenberger has collaborated with UC Berkeley air-safety researchers, reports the Contra-Costa Times:

Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger was the right person to help passengers survive a crisis, said Karlene Roberts, a friend and UC Berkeley professor who co-directs the school’s Center for Catastrophic Risk Management, which researches ways to avoid airline tragedies.

“I can imagine him being sufficiently in charge to get those people out,” Roberts said. “He’s got that kind of personality, which is to his credit.”

The photo taken by eye withnesses has also been very sucessful, as it is written on cnet news pages:

“In fact, Everett said this wasn’t the first time someone had used TwitPic to post a photo of an airplane accident. He explained that a passenger on a Continental Airlines plane that went off the runway in Denver in December used the service to post a photo. But that time, the service was able to stay up.

Perhaps because of the national interest in an airplane accident taking place in direct view of Manhattan, the traffic produced by Krums’ photo was higher than in the case of the Denver accident, Everett suggested. “