source : Los Angeles Times
Pilot was 'the right guy at the right time'
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"Brace for impact," Capt. Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger III, 57, told the 150 passengers of US Airways Flight 1549.
By all early accounts, Sullenberger's deft maneuvering helped turn a potentially catastrophic situation into one remarkable for its lack of casualties.
After setting the aircraft down in one piece, the captain made two passes up and down the aisle to ensure that all of the passengers were off, then allowed rescuers to pluck him off the sinking plane.
Aviation experts said they could not recall another successful controlled water landing by a commercial airliner in the U.S.
New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg dubbed the captain's work "masterful."
New York Gov. David A. Paterson proclaimed Sullenberger heroic and called the incident "a miracle on the Hudson," a moniker immediately taken up by the media.
"Thank the Lord and thank the pilot," passenger Alberto Panero told CNN. "I can't believe he somehow managed to land that plane safely."
It would be difficult to find a pilot who had better credentials to handle the unusual emergency that faced Flight 1549, which apparently hit a flock of Canada geese shortly after taking off from New York's LaGuardia Airport.
Sullenberger, who lives in Danville, Calif., has more than 40 years of flying experience, the last 29 as a captain with US Airways.
He has served as a local safety chairman and accident investigator for the Air Line Pilots Assn., International, according to his resume.
He also is a certified glider pilot, CNN reported, which may have helped him bring the Airbus down gently onto the river.
Before his work as a commercial pilot, Sullenberger had a short but distinguished military career.
He flew an F-4 fighter, a Vietnam-era jet that is notoriously difficult to handle compared with modern aircraft. He was also a mission commander for Red Flag combat training exercises, a coveted position usually assigned to the top pilots.
"He is the consummate pilot," his wife, Lorraine, told the New York Post.
Frank Salzmann, one of Sullenberger's neighbors in Danville, a suburb east of San Francisco, said he was not at all surprised to hear Sullenberger was the pilot who landed the US Airways jet safely, calling him a "very calm, in-control and in-charge type."
"When you think of a captain of an airline, you pretty much think of Sully," said Salzmann, 45, a software engineer.
"It was just the right guy at the right time and at the right moment," added neighbor Jim Walberg. "Everybody is so proud and grateful and relieved."
He noted that Sullenberger, a humble man, would probably chafe at being called a hero.
"It's a name he will not take very easily," Walberg said.
In addition to Sullenberger's "passion for flying," the pilot and his family are involved in community service, working at food banks, raising dogs for the blind and doing walks for cancer research, Salzmann said.
Sullenberger and his wife, who have two teenage daughters, moved to their upscale Danville neighborhood about 11 years ago.
Two years ago, Sullenberger founded Safety Reliability Methods Inc., an aviation safety consulting firm based in the Bay Area.
Sullenberger lists on his resume several achievements in aviation safety, including identifying and helping to correct hundreds of Federal Aviation Administration instrument landing system procedures.
Karlene Roberts, director of UC Berkeley's Center for Catastrophic Risk Management, said she met Sullenberger two years ago when he contacted her about the center's work in reliability enhancement.
Roberts called him a pilot who was "at the top of his game."
On Thursday night, as his jet lay submerged in the frigid Hudson River, anchored at the southern tip of Manhattan, aviation experts said Sullenberger pulled off a maneuver so rare that pilots weren't taught how to execute it.
He faced an exceedingly unusual scenario: Although pilots often have to contend with what they call a "bird strike," it is uncommon for a flock to disable two engines at once, as apparently happened in this case. The plane essentially became a 170,000-pound glider, leaving little room for error.
To turn the aircraft and then land it without it breaking apart was "something that can't be taught," said Barry Schiff, a retired airline pilot who is now an aviation safety consultant in Camarillo.
"If the plane's nose was a little higher or lower, it could have been a disaster," he added, noting that if either wing tipped to one side and hit the water, the plane would have done cartwheels down the river.
But just three minutes after takeoff from La Guardia, with little time to consult checklists dictating how to prepare the aircraft for a water landing, and with warnings probably sounding in the cockpit, Sullenberger managed a perfect shot into the water.
"He just used the seat of his pants on this," Schiff said. "I would love to shake his hand someday."
Water landings are rare. Airline pilots said that they didn't recall specific training about what to do in an incident where they were forced to land on water in an aircraft without power from its engines, also known as a "dead stick" landing.
"I don't recall any specific training toward this particular situation -- in other words, this situation where almost immediately after takeoff you get a foreign object ingestion and it takes your power out immediately," said Mack Moore, a 747-400 pilot who retired from United Airlines five years ago and is a consultant to the Air Line Pilots Assn., which represents 53,000 pilots in the U.S. and Canada.
Although the specifics vary by airline, pilots receive several hours of training each year regarding water landings and evacuation procedures in which they review accidents that occurred on water, said Jon Russell, a commercial pilot and regional safety officer for the Air Line Pilots Assn.
Most training for what's known as "ditching" an aircraft in water assumes that a pilot has a good amount of altitude between the aircraft and the water so they have time to prepare for touching it down.
They follow checklists, including one probably stored electronically in the Airbus A320's cockpit.
Depending on the airline, pilots also do simulator training every six months to a year in which they may practice water landings, said Capt. Rory Kay, a commercial pilot who serves as air safety chairman for the Air Lines Pilot Assn.
"You just have to hope the techniques you're practicing in the simulators end up being what happens when you end going in the water," Kay said.
One longtime commercial pilot who has spent years as a company flight instructor warned that before dubbing Sullenberger a hero, investigators needed to determine whether crew error contributed to the emergency.
The pilot, who did not want to be named, was skeptical that bird strikes shut down both engines.
"I've seen it happen too many times in the simulators -- you get a flameout in one engine and the quick response is to shut down the wrong one," the pilot said.
But Kay said he found it hard to imagine a scenario in which Sullenberger erroneously shut down a working engine if the other had been hit.
"It looks like hats off all around to the cockpit crew," Kay said.
"Ultimately, it was their response and fine, fine airmanship that enabled this to have such a happy ending."
matea.gold@latimes.com
jennifer.oldham@latimes.com
peter.pae@latimes.com
Times staff writers Geraldine Baum, Joanna Lin and Maura Dolan and researcher Robin Mayper contributed to this report.
3 comentarios:
- Anónimo dijo...
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- domingo, enero 11, 2009 8:42:00 AM
- Moises dijo...
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- Anónimo dijo...
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- lunes, enero 12, 2009 5:26:00 PM
Hace un año participó en este concurso:SIENTO MUCHO Y MIS RESPETOS A SU FAMILIA ...PERO MODELO?......NO ENTIENDO O ES QUE ACASO EL TITULO DE MODELO SE LO DAN A CUALQUIERA QUE ENSEñE EL CUERPO EN LA CALLE...
Si es modelo o no eso es lo de menos ahorita. El asunto es que una joven se suicido y el dolor invade a sus seres queridos. Este no es un tema de discusión para decir si es o no una modelo.
Es muy triste saber k una muchacha tan joven y bonita tome una desicion tan drastica. Ojala Dios pueda dar paz a su familia. Y es una falta de respeto k en un momento como este alguien se ponga a cuestionar algo tan estupido como si era o no modelo. Definitivamente algunas personas no tienen sentido común.
Listas las aspirantes al Costa Rica Bikini Contest
Ellas prometen encender San José
Visitas: Las ocho aspirantes visitarán diferentes sitios de interés de la capital. Certamen comienza en marzo
Son bellas, jóvenes, espontáneas y, ante todo, naturales; es decir, “sin ingredientes artificiales”.
Ellas son las aspirantes al concurso Costa Rica Bikini Contest Summer Girl 2008, que comenzará la primera semana de marzo y que, a diferencia de otros certámenes, seleccionó a mujeres “sin retoques de cirugías o bisturís”, según explicó Sheyla Dellmeier, de la productora Opuis 24 Cine y Televisión.
sta empresa es la misma que sacó al aire, en octubre pasado en canal 11, el reality show de modelaje Supermodel Centroamérica, que culminó a principios de febrero y que fue ganado por la panameña Lisette Cáceres.
Con esta nueva propuesta, la productora espera “encender” aún más la época seca de nuestro país con ocho hermosas jóvenes, de entre los 19 y los 24 años, que lucirán sus cuerpos en diferentes zonas del centro de San José, entre ellas la Plaza de la Cultura y el parque Morazán, indicó Dellmeier.
“Estaremos en lugares históricos y turísticos del centro de San José. Queremos rescatar zonas emblemáticas con sesiones fotográficas de altísima calidad”, aseguró la ejecutiva.
Las aspirantes salieron de un casting de más de 100 jóvenes que se presentaron durante dos semanas.
Las jóvenes seleccionadas serán evaluadas por un panel de jueces, cuyos miembros tienen experiencia en el mundo de la moda.
Los principales puntos a calificar serán su desempeño, soltura y actitud en las diferentes presentaciones en traje de baño.
La finalista se escogerá en una actividad especial a mediados del próximo mes, pero antes la gente podrá escoger a su favorito por medio del sitio web del certamen: www.costaricabikinis.com , que estará habilitado a partir del próximo 20 de febrero.
Dellmeier explicó que los cibernautas podrán conocer a las ocho aspirantes de todo el país, ya sea por medio de las galerías de fotos, videos de cada una de ellas y un cronograma de las presentaciones.
La vencedora ganará ¢1 millón en efectivo, una motocicleta Scooter y una membresía por un año en un conocido gimnasio josefino.
De cerca
De entre los 19 y los 24 años
Jazmín Rivera. Rivera tiene 19 años y es vecina de la provincia de Heredia.
Marianela Valverde. Esta josefina residente en Paso Ancho tiene 24 años.
Cinthya Méndez. Esta residente del distrito de San Francisco de Dos Ríos tiene 24 años
Marielos Gamboa. Marielos vive en Alajuela y tiene 22 años. Dijo estar emocionada.
Priscilla Montoya. Ella es una de las concursantes: tiene 19 años y vive en Alajuela
Jennifer Torres. Cuerpo abrasado por el sol, esta porteña tiene 23 años.
Francis Castro. A sus 21 años, esta josefina vecina de Guachipelín aspira al cetro.
Emma Linton. Residente de la provincia de “los mangos”, Linton tiene 22 años.
Alejandra Herrera
aherrera@aldia.co.cr
La alajuelense Marielos Gamboa, participó en el certamen “Summer Girl” en busca de una buena opción en el modelaje y tras otras oportunidades laborales. Pero asegura que la mala planificación del evento la empujó a retirarse.
¿Cómo consideras el modelaje en nuestro país?
Considero que aquí no hay, en cambio, en Europa existe de manera profesional con mayor relevancia. En Costa Rica lo veo como una forma de expresión o pasatiempo.
¿Qué pasó en el “Summer Girl”?
Al principio se proyectaba algo bueno, pero conforme estuvimos, se notó que faltaba organización, aunque muchas chicas audicionaron, muy pocas eran las que quedaban seleccionadas.
¿En qué fallaron?
Nos enteramos al final que no habían premios, muchos patrocinadores se quitaron, además la página de votaciones fue manipulada.
¿Por qué no asististe a la final del concurso?
Yo soy muy responsable e iba a ir si el concurso no lo hubieran hecho un fin de semana, son los días que trabajo, además yo no voy al gimnasio por lo que el único premio no me funcionaba.
¿Y cómo mantienes tu figura sin ir al gimnasio?
Desde que estaba en la escuela me metía en todos los deportes que había, creo que eso me ayuda a mantenerme, porque odio los gimnasios, nunca voy a uno.
¿Te dedicarás a estos eventos por más tiempo?
Por ahora es algo que me gusta, pero no lo veo a largo plazo, muy pronto termino mi carrera y quiero dedicarme a trabajar en ello.
¿Tienes novio?
Sí, tenemos 11 meses.
¿Y es celoso?
(Ríe) sí, pero yo creo que todos somos celosos, lo único diferente es la forma de expresarlo.
¿Cómo te gustan los hombres?
Admito que veo el físico pero me gusta que comprendan mi trabajo, que estudien y es importante que sean muy cariñosos, me encantan así.
¿Estás satisfecha con tu cuerpo?
(Ríe) Yo me veo bien así, no me quiero dedicar a esto mucho tiempo por lo que no me interesa cambiar algunas partes de mi cuerpo.
¿Qué te gusta comer?
De todo, pero prefiero la comida casera o ir a restaurantes típicos.
Foro de Costa Rica
http://www.forodecostarica.com/post323591.html
Amigas de concurso lamentan su muerte
ÚLTIMO ADIÓS A MODELO
Ariel Chaves González
achaves@diarioextra.com
Fotos: cortesía de Juan Caliva
Como olvidarla en el pasado certamen Summer Girl, donde a las modelos les tomaban fotos en la ciudad, bien sexis.
Silvia Serrano, modelo, amiga y compañera de trabajo en diferentes actividades, comentó que aún está consternada por la decisión de su amiga a quien conocía desde hace algún tiempo.
“Me tocaba trabajar con ella en Cartago, pero este viernes no. Trataron de localizarla el viernes al mediodía pero no contestó mensajes. Ella era muy estudiosa. Ella guardaba el dinero, no tomaba, no fumaba, su novio es muy tranquilo. Hace quince días se gradúo de administración aduanera. Era una persona sumamente estudiosa. Ella quería comprarse una casita para llevarse a su mamá porque quería cambiar de lugar donde vivir”.
Por su parte Anthony Mora, productor del Summer Girl, expresó que la noticia fue totalmente inesperada y no dudará en enviar una nota a su familia en Alajuela.
“Yo la verdad, hablando con el resto de la producción, nos sorprendió. No aparentaba que tomaría esa decisión. Quien sabe que clase de problema tenía para tomar la decisión”, expresó.
Al cierre de nota se intentó hablar con la familia para conocer algunos nuevos datos de cara a esclarecer este caso, bien extraño por cierto, pero no fue posible lograrlo.
MURIÓ CON CUERDA QUE NO ESTABA EN LA CASA
Según datos obtenidos en forma extraoficial por este periódico, Marielos murió asfixiada por una cuerda que no se encontraba previamente en la casa o al menos no a la vista de otros familiares. Se sabe que estaba lista para salir de la casa rumbo a Cartago donde todos los viernes, aparentemente, era edecán de un conocido bar en Cartago.
La empresa que la contrató la trató de contactar el viernes al mediodía pero sin éxito hasta que su mamá la halló ahorcada en la casa por la tarde.
El cuerpo fue levantado por autoridades judiciales hasta el sábado.
• Ruslana Korshunova, de 20 años
SUPERMODELO SE SUICIDÓ EN EL 2008
Los suicidios entre modelos no es algo nuevo, en el campo internacional la modelo Ruslana Korshunova, de 20 años, que fue portada de revistas como “Elle” y “Vogue”, falleció en Nueva York el pasado año, al caer desde la ventana de su apartamento en lo que parece ser un suicidio, informaron medios locales.
Korshunova, nacida en Kazajistán, cayó desde el noveno piso del edificio Water Street, en el Distrito Financiero de Nueva York, según fuentes policiales y testigos citados por “The New York Post” y “Newsday” en sus páginas web.
MODELOS DEL SUMMER GIRL LA RECUERDAN
Francis
Castro
“No tengo palabras. La conocí en el concurso. Era una de las que más hablaba. Cuando la conocí jamás pensé que tenía un problema. Era la más conversadora dentro del grupo. No me esperaba esto. Es una de las primeras personas que conocí en el mundo del modelaje. Una muchacha muy tranquila y sencilla”.
Cinthia
Méndez
“Realmente sorprende porque hasta donde yo la conocí era súper trabajadora, súper seria. Una persona amable muy colaboradora. Muy centrada. Me di cuenta por medio de una compañera”.
Jazmín
Zúñiga
“En comparación de todas las chicas del concurso recuerdo que era la más callada pero risueña. De todo lo que nosotros decíamos se reía. Sinceramente no la traté mucho pero la impresión que me dio me sorprendió un montón. Me impactó mucho la noticia y sentí muy feo. Es difícil creer que una persona tan exitosa se dejara llevar por algún problema. Me dolió”.
Daniel Pearl
Daniel Pearl (October 10, 1963 – February 1, 2002) was an American journalist who was kidnapped and murdered in Karachi, Pakistan. At the time of his kidnapping, Pearl served as the South Asia Bureau Chief of the Wall Street Journal, stationed in Mumbai, India, and had been investigating the case of Richard Reid, the shoe bomber, and alleged links between Al Qaeda and Pakistan's Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI).
In July 2002, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, a British national of Pakistani origin was sentenced to death for the abduction and death of Daniel Pearl.
In March 2007, at a closed military hearing in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said that he had personally beheaded Pearl.[1] Then he added, "for those who would like to confirm, there are pictures of me on the Internet holding his head."[2][3]
In April 2006, a documentary film The Journalist and the Jihadi was aired by HBO about the story of Daniel Pearl, narrated by Christiane Amanpour. In June 2007, a motion picture was released about the search for Daniel Pearl starring actress Angelina Jolie and actor Dan Futterman as Mariane and Daniel Pearl in Michael Winterbottom's A Mighty Heart. The film was based on the memoir written by Mariane Pearl.
Early life
Daniel Pearl was born in Princeton, New Jersey, and grew up in Encino in Los Angeles, California, where he attended Portola Middle School and Birmingham High School. His father, Judea Pearl, is a professor at UCLA. His mother, of Iraqi Jewish descent, is named Ruth. The history of the family and its connections to Israel are described by Judea Pearl in a book by Alan Dershowitz, What Israel means to me.[4] Danny, as he was known throughout his life, attended Stanford Universityfrom 1981 to 1985, where he stood out as a communications major with Phi Beta Kappa honors, a member of the Alpha Delta Phi Fraternity, and co-founded a student newspaper called the Stanford Commentator. Pearl graduated Stanford with a B.A. in Communications, after which he spent a summer as a Pulliam Fellow intern at the Indianapolis Star and a winter bussing tables as a ski bum in Idaho. Following a trip to the then-Soviet Union, China, and Europe, he joined the North Adams Transcript and the Berkshire Eagle in western Massachusetts, then moved on to the San Francisco Business Times.In 1990, Pearl started in the The Wall Street Journal's Atlanta bureau and moved to the Washington, D.C. bureau in 1993 to cover telecommunications. He jumped to the Journal's London bureau in 1996, penning articles such as the October 1994 story of a Stradivarius violin allegedly found on a highway on-ramp[5], and a June 2000 story about Iranian pop music. His most notable investigations covered the ethnic wars in the Balkan where he discovered that charges of a genocide committed in Kosovo were unsubstantiated, and the American missile attack on military facility in Khartum, which he proved to be a pharmaceutical factory.
Later, he met and married his wife Mariane. Their son, Adam Daniel Pearl was born in Paris on May 28, 2002, three months after Daniel's death.
In 2002, Pearl received the Elijah Parish Lovejoy Award from Colby College (Awarded Posthumously): and, in 2007, the Lyndon Baines Johnson Moral Courage Award from the Houston Holocaust Museum.
Death
On January 23, 2002, on his way to what he thought was an interview with Sheikh Mubarak Ali Gilani at the Village restaurant in Karachi, Pearl was kidnapped by a militant group calling itself The National Movement for the Restoration of Pakistani Sovereignty. This group claimed Pearl was a CIA agent and — using the e-mail address[1] — sent the United States a range of demands, including the freeing of all Pakistani terror detainees, and the release of a halted U.S. shipment of F-16fighter jets to the Pakistani government.
The message read:
Photos of Pearl handcuffed with a gun at his head and holding up a newspaper were attached. There was no response to pleas from Pearl's editor, and from his wife Mariane.
Nine days later, Pearl was murdered and beheaded. Pearl's body was found cut into ten pieces and buried in a shallow grave in the outskirts of Karachi on May 16. When the police found his remains, Abdul Sattar Edhi arrived promptly on the scene, personally collected all ten body parts, and took them to the morgue; then his body was returned to the United States and he was interred in the Mount Sinai Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles, California.
(Although foul play was obvious, no autopsy was needed or performed. The subsequent video (see next section) made the sequence of events clear. Years later,Khalid Shaikh Mohammed confessed to cutting off Pearl's head, but didn't state whether he had cut his throat: it is likely that one person did both.)