‘Miracle on the Hudson’

NEW YORK (AP) — With both engines out, a cool-headed pilot maneuvered his crowded jetliner over New York City and ditched it in the frigid Hudson River on Thursday, and all 155 on board were pulled to safety as the plane slowly sank. It was, the governor said, “a miracle on the Hudson.”

One victim suffered two broken legs, a paramedic said, but there were no other reports of serious injuries.

The US Airways Airbus A320 bound for Charlotte, N.C., struck a flock of birds during takeoff minutes earlier at LaGuardia Airport, apparently disabling the engines.

The pilot, identified as Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger III of Danville, Calif., “was phenomenal,” passenger Joe Hart said. “He landed it — I tell you what — the impact wasn’t a whole lot more than a rear-end [collision]. It threw you into the seat ahead of you.

“Both engines cut out, and he actually floated it into the river,” he added.

In a city still wounded from the aerial attack on the World Trade Center, authorities were quick to assure the public that terrorism wasn’t involved.

The plane was submerged up to its windows in the river by the time rescuers arrived in Coast Guard vessels and ferries. Some passengers waded in water up to their knees, standing on the wing of the plane and waiting for help.

Police divers had to rescue some of the passengers from underwater, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. Among those on board was one infant who appeared to be fine, the mayor said.

Helen Rodriguez, a paramedic who was among the first to arrive at the scene, said she saw one woman with two broken legs. Fire officials said others were evaluated for hypothermia, bruises and other minor injuries.

“We had a miracle on 34th Street. I believe now we have had a miracle on the Hudson,” Gov. David Paterson said.

The crash took place on a 20-degree day, one of the coldest of the season in New York. The water temperature was 36 degrees, Coast Guard Lt. Commander Moore said. He estimates that hypothermia can hit within five to eight minutes at that temperature.

“The captain said, ‘Brace for impact because we’re going down,”’ passenger Jeff Kolodjay said. He said passengers put their heads in their laps and started praying. He said the plane hit the water pretty hard, but he was fine.

“It was intense. It was intense. You’ve got to give it to the pilot. He made a hell of a landing,” Kolodjay said.

Another passenger, Fred Berretta, who was on his way home to Charlotte from a business trip, told CNN doors were opened on both sides of the plane “as soon as we hit the water.”

Witnesses said the plane’s pilot appeared to guide the plane down.

Paramedics treated at least 78 patients, fire officials said. Coast Guard boats rescued 35 people who were immersed in the frigid water and ferried them to shore. One commuter ferry, the Thomas Jefferson of the company NY Waterway, arrived within minutes of the crash, and some of its own riders grabbed life vests and lines of rope and tossed them to plane passengers in the water.

“They were cheering when we pulled up,” ferry captain Vincent Lombardi. “We had to pull an elderly woman out of a raft in a sling. She was crying. ... People were panicking. They said, ‘Hurry up, hurry up.”’

Two police scuba divers said they pulled another woman from a lifeboat “frightened out of her mind” and lethargic from hypothermia.

US Airways Flight 1549 took off at 3:26 p.m. It was less than a minute later when the pilot reported a “double bird strike” and said he needed to return to LaGuardia, said Doug Church, a spokesman for the National Air Traffic Controllers Association.

Sullenberger, 58, described himself in an online professional profile as a 29-year employee of US Airways.