Hudson River :US Plane Crash photos

Hudson River :US Plane Crash photos

The plane which went down shortly after takeoff, was travelling from New York's LaGuardia Airport to Charlotte, North Carolina. Preliminary reports indicate that the Airbus was forced to make an emergency landing after both engines failed. This may have resulted from a collision with a flock of geese shortly after takeoff. The federal National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the incident.

Plane Crashes into Hudson River in US

Plane Crashes into Hudson River in US

Plane Crashes into Hudson River in US (photos)

A US Airways passenger plane carrying 155 people has crashed into the Hudson River in New York. US Coast Guard came for their rescue immediatly and all passengers and crew were  rescued. 

US Airbus A320 floating in the Hudson River

US Airways Flight 1549

Airbus A320 floating in the Hudson River

On January 15, 2009 the US Airbubus was found floating in the Hudson River.

Due to a Multiple bird strike the US Airbus A320 was forced for a emergency water landing in Hudson River between New York City Near 48th Street and Port Imperial at Weehawken, New Jersey, United States.

US Airways Flight 1549 is a regularly scheduled daily two-leg commercial passenger flight operating from LaGuardia Airport in New York City to Charlotte/Douglas International Airport in Charlotte, North Carolina, and SeaTac Airport servicing Seattle and Tacoma, Washington. The first leg of this flight on January 15, 2009, ended about six minutes after takeoff in a forced ditching made in the Hudson River at about 3:32 pm. The flight's twin-jet Airbus A320 is believed to have ingested birds in both engines about two minutes after takeoff from LaGuardia's Runway 4 resulting in apparent bilateral compressor stalls and partial or complete loss of thrust in both powerplants. All on board survived the accident.

The plane in the Hudson River surrounded by U.S. Coast Guard, FDNY, NYPD, and ferry boats

On January 15, 2009, Flight 1549 took off from Runway 4 at LaGuardia Airport in New York City at 3:26 p.m. EST (20:26 UTC) with 150 passengers and five crew members. The flight's Captain was Chesley Burnett "Sully" Sullenberger III, a United States Air Force Academy graduate who flew F-4 Phantoms for the U.S. Air Force from 1973 to 1980 and US Airways aircraft thereafter. His first officer was Jeff Skiles, 49, also a veteran pilot with US Airways, with more than 23 years of experience.

The plane, an Airbus A320, was scheduled to fly to Charlotte/Douglas International Airport and then on to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in SeaTac, Washington.

A spokeswoman Laura Brown said that preliminary information indicates the plane's engines were damaged by a bird strike shortly after takeoff. Unofficial radar returns show that the flight reached a maximum altitude of 3,200 feet (975 meters) before beginning its descent. The Captain radioed to air traffic control that he had experienced a bird strike and declared an emergency. Passengers reported smelling fuel before the landing.

Ditching

One of the pilots initially requested permission to attempt an emergency landing at an airport he saw below the plane. Air traffic controllers identified the airport as Teterboro Airport in Bergen County, New Jersey. The instruction to land at Teterboro was the last communication with the plane before the pilots decided to ditch on the Hudson River due to a lack of altitude. The captain said, "Brace for impact.".

About six minutes after takeoff, the plane touched down in the Hudson River heading southbound near 48th Street in Manhattan and Port Imperial in Weehawken, New Jersey, less than a mile from Times Square and the busy streets of Midtown Manhattan, and within 3,000 feet of three ferryboat terminals. A witness stated that the plane approached the water at a gradual angle and made a big splash. From his vantage point in an office building, it appeared that the plane was not travelling at a particularly high speed, and that it made slow contact with the water. Prior to landing, air traffic control at LaGuardia reported seeing flight 1549 pass over the George Washington Bridge by less than 900 feet.

By landing successfully on water, the Captain "achieved one of the rarest and most technically challenging feats in commercial aviation", reports the Wall Street Journal.

Passengers

Local ferries and tugs began almost immediately to rescue passengers; some of whom were standing on the wings of the floating plane, while others entered life rafts Within minutes. 

police helicopters, Coast Guard vessels, rescue divers, as well as FDNY fireboat John D. McKean were on scene to help with the rescue and recovery effort. All of the passengers and flight crew were evacuated safely, though there are reported to be several mild injuries.

FDNY had 35 ambulances ready for patients coming off the flight. In addition, about 30 other ambulances were made available by other organizations, including several hospital-based ambulances (St. Vincent, St. Barnabas), and about 20 crews from various Hatzolah organizations. Various agencies also provided medical help on the Jersey City side of the river.

Saint Vincent's Catholic Medical Center in Greenwich Village received patients from the incident (as well as St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital Center), to which five to ten passengers were taken for care, entirely due to exposure to cold conditions. Roosevelt Hospital received an additional ten patients. In all, fifteen passengers were treated at hospitals while others were looked after in triage facilities.

Of the 150 passengers, more than 20 were employees of Bank of America, headquartered at the plane's initial destination of Charlotte.

Aftermath:

Following the rescue, the plane remained afloat and was eventually tied to a pier near the World Financial Center in Lower Manhattan, roughly four miles downstream from where it landed, to prevent it from floating out to sea.

At 4:55 p.m. fire crews began to stand down. At 5:07 p.m. , Doug Parker, the CEO of US Airways, issued an official statement during a press conference in Tempe, Arizona, in which he confirmed that the forced ditching was due to an accident. The most severe injury confirmed as of 5:26 p.m. was a leg fracture received by a flight attendant; the flight attendant was scheduled to undergo surgery.

Drag racing

Drag racing mourns death of Funny Car driver for second straight season
ENGLISHTOWN, N.J. -- He was strong and determined, wearing a name that exemplified the tough and unforgiving attitude drag racing demands from its winners.
Scott Kalitta lost his life in a top-end accident at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park while driving his DHL-sponsored nitro Funny Car on Saturday. The violence of the crash and the stultifying devastation that ended his life at 46 years of age was a sobering shock to the drag-racing world at a time when much is being made about the safety advances that have recently enhanced the level of protection Funny Car drivers can count on.
But beneath the painful realities of the catastrophic accident that claimed Kalitta's life, the sport mourns a racer, a father, a son and a two-time champion who took great pride and satisfaction in the tradition and historical significance the name Kalitta brought to drag racing.
Kalitta's father, Connie Kalitta, was one of the sport's founding fathers in the 1950s and '60s, building and driving an infamous string of front-engined Top Fuel dragsters bearing the name "Bounty Hunter." Connie Kalitta was a no-compromise, no-excuses, no-retreat, hard-nosed competitor who raced to win and did whatever was necessary to accomplish that.
Scott was the mirror of his dad, and there was no better example of his unbreakable will to win than his exceptional performances during his back-to-back Top Fuel title years in 1994 and 1995. With legendary tuner Dick LaHaie guiding his team, Scott was the most feared and respected driver in the class, and veteran NHRA drag racing announcer Bob Frey frequently expressed this opinion to the listening public:
"If I'm in Top Fuel, the one thing I don't want to see is that Kalitta car pulling up in that other lane."
Kalitta took brief sabbaticals from the quarter-mile twice during his racing career when his ownership of a cargo airline and boat marina in Florida demanded his attention. But when he was ready to return to drag racing, he did so with the same energy and fervor that had always marked his competitive urges. Not one to do things half-heartedly, Kalitta didn't pursue drag racing as a frivolous hobby. It was what drove him.
His death took on an even greater tragic dimension because of his father's near-invincible track record in primitive, unsophisticated race cars -- machines that were truly low-tech in their design and safety accommodations. To be sure, the elder Kalitta had more than his share of bumps, bruises and broken bones throughout his five decades behind the wheel, but somehow avoided that one, horrific incident that might have ended his long career.
Yet, it was his son -- aboard what may be one of the safest and technologically advanced racing machines in professional motorsports -- who suffered a fatal mishap without warning, and at least at this point, a logical explanation. And in the end, has anyone ever been able to attach any semblance of rhyme or reason to the mysterious circumstances or convoluted chain of fateful serendipities that frequently accompany the sudden loss of a racing star?
And so we find ourselves for the second consecutive NHRA POWERade season mourning the death of a beloved Funny Car driver. In 2007, it was another second-generation personality, Eric Medlen. Now we must come to grips with the all-too-abrupt passing of Scott Kalitta. But if it were possible to hear from either of these young, courageous racers as we reflect on their losses, their message would be clear and concise and would help to remind us how much they loved the sport and how much it enriched their lives.
"We have no regrets," they would say. "If we had it to do all over again, we would race our cars and we would race to win. Anything less isn't living."

funny car

Scott Kalitta didn't have to drag race a Funny Car. His life was good without it. The family air transport business was thriving.
But Kalitta wanted back in the car. He missed it, he needed it, he loved it.
That passion brought him back to NHRA drag racing after a three-year retirement. On Saturday, it cost him his life.
Kalitta, 46, was killed in a fiery accident during qualifying at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park in Englishtown, N.J.
With the help of John Force Racing, which worked tirelessly to improve safety over the past year, everyone involved in the NHRA had hoped these tragic moments were behind them.
But Kalitta's death will bring further scrutiny to safety issues in the NHRA, with many people wondering why two fatalities have occurred in the past two seasons.
Kalitta is the second Funny Car driver to lose his life in a crash in only 15 months. Eric Medlen died on March 23, 2007, from injuries he suffered in a testing session accident in Gainesville, Fla., four days earlier.
NHRA legend John Force, a 14-time Funny Car champion and the owner of the team Medlen drove for, also suffered serious leg and arm injuries on a crash during the NHRA event at the Texas Motorplex in Ennis last September.
Force was devastated by Medlen's death, a man he called "the son he never had." Force has four daughters, including Funny Car driver Ashley Force.
He held his team out of the Houston event after Medlen's death and dedicated himself to revolutionizing safety in the sport.
Force didn't want to talk about Kalitta's death on Saturday. Other than Kalitta's family, this has to be harder on Force than anyone in the sport.
Force and his team have dedicated themselves over the past year to improving the safety of Funny Cars, working in conjunction with the NHRA to make significant changes to the structure of the cars. Among the improvements:
• A larger roll cage to keep the driver's head from bouncing off the tubing in an accident.
• Increased padding around the roll cage for more protection for the driver.
Even with these advancements, Force suffered the worst injury of his career five months later in a collision with Kenny Bernstein's car. Force's legs were shattered, and he had multiple ankle fractures, deep knee lacerations and ligament damage, a broken wrist and mangled fingers.
Force didn't race the rest of the season but continued to make safety improvements to the cars:
• An enclosed tub for the drivers to protect their legs and arms in a crash.
• Additional support bars to strengthen a "weakness" found on the steering support.
• Increased thickness on chassis tubing from 1 3/8 inches to 1½ inches.
• A third rail on the side of the cars for added protection on the upper part of the driver's body. This added weight to the car, so the NHRA mandated a 100-pound weight increase for 2008.
• A blue box data recorder to study the G-forces of an impact in an accident.
This was deeply personal for Force. He didn't do it for himself. His four-car team is a family operation. Ashley is one of the rising stars in the sport. She became the first woman in history to win a Funny Car event earlier this season.
Robert Hight, Force's son-in-law, also is one of the top competitors in the NHRA, finishing 19 points short of winning the championship last year.
At age 58, Force knows his driving days will end soon, but he wants to do everything he can to make the cars safe for the people he loves.
He has done everything he knew to do, but now another Funny Car racer has died. Where does the NHRA go from here?
Kalitta's death came on the same day that Top Fuel racer Alan Bradshaw said on national TV that he got out of his dragster and quit because he felt his team had compromised safety on recent changes made to the car.
Having two deaths in such a short period of time is extremely rare in this era of professional racing. It stands out dramatically in comparison to other racing series. NASCAR hasn't suffered a fatality since Dale Earnhardt's death in the 2001 Daytona 500, thanks to numerous safety advancements.
Kalitta's death will bring questions that have no answers. It's too early to know all the details of Kalitta's accident. The engine exploded about 1,000 feet into his run. The car didn't slow down, zooming at close to 300 mph as it went through the sand pit at the end of the track before crashing at the back of the facility.
Kalitta proved long ago he could race with the best of the best in guiding a 7,000-horsepower machine down a quarter-mile track in less than five seconds. He won Top Fuel dragster championships in 1994 and '95 before retiring after the 1999 season.
But Kalitta couldn't stay away. It was in his blood. He returned in 2003, driving for his famous father's team.
Connie Kalitta, Scott's dad, is one of the true legends of drag racing. A former driver and a longtime crew chief and team owner, he led Shirley Muldowney to her historic first Top Fuel title in 1977.
Scott Kalitta was racing for his father. Doug Kalitta, Scott's cousin, drives a Top Fuel dragster for Connie's team. Now one of the NHRA's most renowned operations must regroup and try to make sense of an unthinkable loss.
Force and his team know that feeling all too well. And the NHRA hopes to find a solution so no one has to feel that way again.

Scott kalitta crash video

Scott Kalitta Crash Video Online: Shocking Footage Aired on Replay
By Josh HartJun 22, 2008
From:http://www.nationalledger.com
Perhaps the replay of the Scott Kalitta crash video should have never been shown on television. It is a horrific feeling watching the replay on television but it is being broadcast on national news shows such as on ESPN Sportcenter all the way down to the local news TV stations that are either working it into their sports segments or showing it during the news section of the show with a warning.
Scott Kalitta Crash Video Online: Shocking Footage Aired on ReplayThe replay is straight from a qualifying drag racing segment as Scott Kalitta races down the track in his funny car. His car is estimated to be moving at 300 miles per hour. The car bursts into flames and explodes and there is nothing to stop him at the end track. He crashes the car and the fireball moves upwards into the sky. Gasps can be heard on the online video and the film clip is shocking.
***There is a warning issued in the YouTube clip that is online from ESPN that tells people that they might want to turn away. Others in some media outlets don't issue the warning. The clip is here but keep in mind, there was no saving the driver and Scott Kalitta perished in the wreck.The crash occurred during what is known as the final round of qualifying. The drag race is the Lucas Oil NHRA SuperNationals and the event is held in Englishtown, New Jersey at Old Bridge Township Raceway Park.