Fly by Wire: The Geese, the Glide, the Miracle on the Hudson

by William Langewiesche

On January 15, 2009, a US Airways Airbus A320 had just taken off from LaGuardia Airport in New York when a flock of Canada geese collided with it, destroying both of its engines. Over the next three minutes, the plane's pilot, Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger, managed to glide it to a safe landing in the Hudson River. It was an instant media sensation, the "Miracle on the Hudson," and Captain Sully was the hero. But how much of the success of this dramatic landing can actually be credited to the genius of the pilot? To what extent is the "miracle" on the Hudson the result of extraordinary, but not widely known, and in some cases quite controversial, advances in aviation and computer technology over the past twenty years?

In Fly by Wire, one of America's greatest journalists takes us on a strange and unexpected journey into the fascinating world of advanced aviation. From the testing laboratories where engineers struggle to build a jet engine that can systematically resist bird attacks, through the creation of the A320 in France, to the political and social forces that have sought to minimize the impact of the revolutionary fly-by-wire technology, William Langewiesche assembles the untold stories necessary to truly understand the

"miracle" on the Hudson, and makes us question our assumptions about human beings in

modern aviation.

Genres: Nonfiction, Aviation, History, Science, Audiobook, Aircraft, Technology

193 pages, Hardcover

First published November 5, 2009

About the author

William Archibald Langewiesche was an American author and journalist who was also a professional airplane pilot for many years. From 2019, he was a writer at large for The New York Times Magazine. Prior to that, he was a correspondent for The Atlantic and Vanity Fair magazines for twenty-nine years. He was the author of nine books and the winner of two National Magazine Awards.
He wrote articles covering a wide range of topics from shipbreaking, wine critics, the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster, modern ocean piracy, nuclear proliferation, and the World Trade Center cleanup.

Reviews

[Eric_W · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's a mantra of mine that there's no point reading about events in the newspaper because the whole truth will not surface until time has passed and someone has written a book about the incident. I am fascinated by technology and especially transportation technology and follow NTSB reports carefully and with interest since, as another favorite author, Henry Petroski has pointed out, we learn more from our failures than from our successes. But it's nice when you get a really good author to summarize things. Langewiesche is one of my favorite authors. A pilot himself, he has written extensively about flying, so he was a logical person to analyze the famous A320 landing in the Hudson. As even Sullenburger as pointed out, the resultant success was certainly no miracle, it was a tribute to training and the competence of the pilots. That they managed to pull it off in the midst of horrible union-management relationship is perhaps even more remarkable.

Sullenberger had a trait that was perhaps even more important than training, focus, the ability to exclude all outside distractions and zero in on what needed to be done at the time. This trait was even more evident after the landing when he was being interviewed and dissected on television. Langewiesche contrasts his reactions to that of Skiles, his co-pilot, a man of many thousands of hours of experience (albeit in successive airplane types as the airline kept switching) who will probably never make captain because of cutbacks in the industry and who only had a few dozen hours in the A320. Sullenberger's focus translated into a realization that this was an opportunity to gain financial security for his family (his pension had been wiped out and his salary cut by 40% even as US Airways executive pay had increased.) It would also provide the chance to say some things about the industry while people were listening. At the NTSB hearing, following adulation and applause from the audience, "he said, 'I am worried that the airline piloting profession will not be able to continue to attract the best and the brightest.' His message was that successive generations of pilots willing to work for lower wages might perform less well in flight, and especially during emergencies. Sullenberger seems to believe this, but it is a questionable assertion, since it links financial incentive to individual competence, and ignores the fact that, with exceptions, the 'best and the brightest” have never chosen to become airline pilots, at whatever salary, because of the terrible this-is-my-life monotony of the job. Furthermore, although unusual stupidity is often fatal in flying, the correlation between superior intelligence and safety is unproven, given the other factors that intrude—especially arrogance, boredom, and passive rebellions of various kinds. If you had to pick the most desirable trait for airline pilots, it would probably be placidity." Sullenberger was politically astute, unlike Skiles who had nothing nice to say about US Airways management, yet the book Sullenberger was carrying and reading on this trip was "Just Culture: Balancing Safety and Accountability, about precisely such issues in the airlines and similar organizations."

The A320 is a unique airplane, almost semi-robotic in design and the fact is that the plane did a lot of the flying after losing both engines. Pilots didn't like the idea behind the plane because in theory it was built on the principle that computers can fly better than any human and, indeed, should override pilots in times of emergency. (This is certainly the case in the AA crash in 2001 over New York when the co-pilot over stressed the rudder in reaction to wake turbulence.) The Airbus engineers "knew that the airplane’s flight-control computers had performed remarkably well, seamlessly integrating themselves into Sullenberger’s solutions and intervening assertively at the very end to guarantee a survivable touchdown. The test pilots believed that the airplane’s functioning was a vindication of its visionary design."

Both pilots were well-rested, at the beginning of a four-day trip that would involve switching airplanes with other crews as the airline attempts to keep airplanes constantly in the air generating revenue. While pay has been cut for pilots on most airlines, the job does allow for a considerable amount of time at home and Sullenberger had averaged 16 hours of flying per week. Because he lived far away from his home base, he had to "dead-head" often to his first flight of the rotation. US Airways was not the greatest company t work for. In and out of bankruptcy, surviving only because of post-2001 government bailouts, it had reduced costs by more than a billion dollars by shaving salaries of employees and reducing the number of aircraft. Sullenberger was quoted as saying the airline executives used "employees like an ATM." Finally it was taken over by America West, (which gave up its name and assumed US Airways as the corporate logo) a relatively well-run company partially wned by Airbus, which explains the parking of 737s and other non-Airbus models. But war had been declared between pilots of the former and the latter over the terms of the newly unified contract. When they left New York, the plane had an extremely experienced crew, the cabin attendants each having more than 25 years of experience, Doreen Welsh alone had 38 years of airline work. "Between the pilots up front and the flight attendants in the cabin, this was not a crew you wanted to complain to about the peanuts." That's not the only humor. Langewiesche remarks on the ever-increasing safety announcements: "the do-not-hide-in-the-bathrooms-and-try-to-smoke-after-disabling-the-smoke-detectors, the thank-you-for-flying-our-miserable-airline." Ironically, the one thing they did not mention was that the emergency slides could be disconnected ad used as life rafts. On a flight to Charlotte? Who needs life rafts? No mention was made of life-vests as US Airways, to save money, had disconnected the video system that discussed all the safety features including life-vests, which explains why so few passengers actually had them on. It was lucky no one drowned.

Traffic at LaGuardia that day was considered light. At most other airports in the country the same level of traffic would have been overwhelming. LaGuardia's controllers were brilliantly handling landing and departing flights on runways that crossed and interweaving snowplows on the runways at the same time. "He put Northwest into position on Runway 4, ready to roll through the first gap offered by the inbound traffic and the plows. By no means was he yet working at his full capacity. One gets the feeling he was simultaneously juggling eggs and maybe playing Scrabble, just to limber up for the evening rush still to come." If you ever fly United tune to channel 9 where you can listen in on the cockpit radio chatter. Fascinating. (If anyone really cares, let me know and I'll recount an astonishing conversation I heard flying into Allentown, PA, one afternoon.)

Bird strikes are fairly common (an earlier issue of Airways magazine has some rather interesting pictures of damage done to planes following collision with a bird) hitting planes several hundred thousand times between 1990 and 2007. On that day there had been no reports of birds (they are so common over NY what would be the point?) and even though they showed up on the raw radar image (it's cleaned up for controllers) it would have been of no use since the controllers would have had no idea of their altitude. Why the birds did not move out of the way is the source of some interesting speculation on the part of bird experts. The one I liked was "that in their own manner the geese might also simply have thought, “What the fuck! We have the right of way here!” He was joking, sort of."

This is a remarkable story, remarkably told, providing context and detail not available in one place elsewhere. It's also an encomium to a brilliantly designed airplane.

[Namera [The Literary Invertebrate] · Rating 4 out of 5]

⤅ Nonfiction Book of the Month: April
Langewiesche is, without question, my favourite writer on aviation or maritime catastrophes. His article on the sinking of the Estonia in 1994 is a marvel of literary engineering. This one isn't a catastrophe though; it's actually about US Airways Flight 1549, which famously landed safely on the Hudson in 2009 after a bird strike.

His explanation of the whole incident is bound up in an explanation of the fly-by-wire system pioneered by Airbus. He's a really interesting (not to mention funny) writer, and manages not to make things too technical: it's absolutely accessible to your average layperson, e.g. myself. The problem however is that the actual Hudson incident only took 5 minutes from start to finish. So even though this is a short book, he puts in some other stuff to fill it out - mostly, descriptions of other crashes/near misses. I enjoyed reading about them, but they can make the book feel a little unstructured, since there's nothing terribly unifying about a bunch of chapters on random plane incidents.

[Thom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent counterpoint to Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters, though better written. Langewiesche's dry humor comes through at times as he depicts both the events and the history that led to them. The best chapters (and the origin of the title) are the description of the Fly-by-Wire design of the Airbus planes and a comparison to Boeing craft from the same era. Interestingly, Sullenberger never mentions this factor in his book, perhaps intentionally.

Excellent coverage is also given to the NTSB investigation and hearing - which plays prominently in the trailer I saw for the movie Sully. Highest Duty also glosses over this for the most part.

A quick read, and definitely the better book, though I am glad I read both before the film.

[Russell · Rating 5 out of 5]

Perhaps it's my science/engineering background speaking, but this book hits on all levels. With his usual deeply-researched, clearly-explained prose, Langewiesche explains all the relevant technologies playing into Chesley Sullenberger's near-perfect response to losing both engines 90 seconds after takeoff from striking a formation of Canada geese. Langewiesche addresses the relevant aspects of flight (wings, flaps, gear, etc.), the actions of the ground controllers, and the crystal-clear focus on flying the airplane that resulted in Sullenberger's safe landing on the Hudson River. On the way, he presents special fly-by-wire aspects of the Airbus A320 that undoubtedly deserve much of the credit for this success. I've never encountered a book by Langewiesche that I didn't enjoy, and this one continues the string.

[Claudia · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fly by wire is the colloquial term for the electronic interface flight system that not only stabilizes the aircraft and makes fine-tune adjustments to "the flight protection envelope" but prevents the pilot from performing excessive maneuvers that could endanger the aircraft as well as the crew and passengers aboard. Or so I understand. . . .

Focused on the accident when US Airways Flight 1549 struck a flock of Canadian geese shortly after takeoff from LaGuardia Airport in New York City in January 2009. Alternating between what was happening on the aircraft with information on the development and standards for aircraft, it provides a interesting view not only on this incident but on the aviation industry itself. We've heard of many occurrences where aircraft have been disabled by bird strikes and the jet turbine engines can take small bird 'ingestion' with little difficulty but the larger ones - like the 10-12 pound Canadian geese - just shred the internals. Which was what happened with Flight 1549.

There are books written about the incident from the viewpoint of several of the passengers as well as Sullenberger but this is from the more along the lines of an accident investigation with historic references to aviation safety standards. Including some references to other accidents and the causes - some stupid egotistic pilot antics as well as mechanical failures -behind some accidents in the past few decades.

So - alot of technical parts but also enough of the drama to keep the reader interested.

2022-035

[Alex Sarll]

Despite my suspicion of current affairs books (at least in part down to being a middle-aged male middle-manager in a minor city centre firm, and thus expected to read such things) I loved Langewiesche's The Outlaw Sea, so this seemed worth a punt. Early on it did seem he was padding madly to get 193 pages out of the six minutes in 2009 between take-off and river landing of Flight 1549; the page on the average heights and weights of the passengers was almost parodically dull. But for the most part he knows when to focus on the minutiae, and which digressions will bear fruit; among other things, this is the story of how, since the 1970s, airline pilot has gone from being a glamorous dream job to another underpaid and demoralised victim of late-stage capitalism. Which then sets up an interference pattern with the idea of greater automation of aircraft, because won't that just weaken pilots' position further? Of course, as so often, the unions are their own long-term worst enemies here, with the ludicrous assertion that "the pilot is never at fault". Langewiesche - himself with 15 years of piloting experience - demonstrates precisely how wrong that is; there's a particularly read-between-fingers section detailing the first Airbus crash, and quite what a moronic show-off the pilot had to be in order finally to cause it. On the other hand, the pilot on that day in New York was indeed a hero. Langewiesche is very careful about never letting the advances in technology detract from how well Chesley Sullenberger did to get all his crew and passengers out alive after a midwinter river landing without engines, but also points out the degree to which world aviation can't rely on every pilot being that good. Then too, there's the degree of difference between Sullenberger's life-saving calm (one might almost conclude, though Langewiesche never quite says it, that he's the dull, methodical sort more commonly associated with accountancy) and the buccaneering attitude which I at least still automatically associate with the word 'pilot'. Still, as the guiding spirit of Airbus design notes, any pilot who wants to do the exciting stuff should find non-airline ways to do it, which don't involve the lives of hundreds of innocents behind them.

[Howard C. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting from an engineering standpoint in discussing the issues of flight controls and human engineering in the Airbus, not at all dramatized, but I'm a little frustrated that it's not more detailed. If it wasn't going to go into the "miracle flight", I'd like to have seen more discussion of the theory; it's a short book

[Wayne · Rating 3 out of 5]

A quick four hour read that adds some technical details to the account of the famous "Miracle on the Hudson" ditching by Sully Sullenberger. The author posits that some aspects of the Airbus alpha contraints assisted Sully in his successful landing on the river.

[Cindy · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was disappointed with this book. I expected a narrative of the events on the Hudson River. I didn't expect all of the extra the author included. It reminded me of a poorly focused student essay.

[Left Coast Justin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Honestly: If Langewiesche tackles a topic, there's no need to read anybody else's take on it. Here, he explores the crash-landing of an Airbus in the Hudson River with no fatalities, aka "The Miracle on the Hudson."

This was the kind of nonfiction that you stay up late to finish. Here's how it starts:

On the afternoon of last January 15, a flock of Canada geese flew about 3,000 feet above the Bronx in a loose echelon formation, tending to their own business as usual, with nothing special in mind. Much about those particular geese will never be known—for instance, where they came from, and where they were headed, and why—but it is likely that they were large, well fed, and self-satisfied. Evidently they were also fairly dumb. Their stupidity cannot be held against them, since they were just birds, after all, but geese are said to be adaptive creatures, and it is hard not to think that they should have had better sense than to go wandering through New York City’s skies.

OH, and this, a few pages later:

Objective observers of the hazards do not fault geese alone. The experts at assigning blame are two employees of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Dr. Richard Dolbeer and Sandra Wright, who work out of an office in Sandusky, Ohio, where they preside over the Federal Aviation Administration’s National Wildlife Strike Database. Their records from 1990 through 2007 indicate that aircraft in the United States (and some U.S. airliners abroad) collided with 369 conclusively identified species of birds. The birds included loons, grebes, pelicans, cormorants, herons, storks, egrets, swans, ducks, vultures, hawks, eagles, cranes, sandpipers, seagulls, pigeons, cuckoos, owls, turkeys, blackbirds, crows, chickadees, woodpeckers, hummingbirds, mockingbirds, parrots, and a single parakeet. Over the same period, airplanes officially collided with bats on 253 occasions. Furthermore, they had 760 official collisions with deer, 252 with coyotes, 182 with rabbits, 120 with rodents including porcupines, 74 with turtles, 59 with opossums, 16 with armadillos, 14 with alligators, 7 with iguanas, 4 with moose, 2 with caribou, and one each with a wild pig and a donkey. There was also an official collision with a fish, though the fish was in the grasp of an osprey at the time.

[Elizabeth · Rating 2 out of 5]

I made it to page 81. If you’re a pilot or know something about airplanes, this book is really tough to read.
“During those descents the engines may be throttled back to a minimum setting known as ‘flight idle,’ at which they provide hardly any thrust at all and, unbeknownst to the passengers, the airplanes glide for as much as fifty miles until arriving at the desired lower altitudes, where power is again applied.”

The cover does say that it’s a dramatically-told account.
I don’t often post reviews, but I wish I hadn’t wasted time on this book.
Two stars for creativity, and if a young person didn’t know anything about airplanes and/or wanted to learn about all the species of geese, they may be able to read it.

[Alice · Rating 3 out of 5]

The amazing story of the "Miracle on the Hudson" is told in a very readable fashion by Mr. Langewiesche. While the movie with Tom Hanks based on the water landing didn't go into the technical details that fill this book, we are given much more background on "Sully" (the pilot) and the co-pilot. I confess that I skimmed over many of the explanations of how planes differ from one another, how this particular plane behaves, etc. What fascinated me instead were the profiles of the two pilots, their calm and the efficiency and calm of the entire flight crew. If you are interested in aircraft, this book will fill you with as much detail as you like. If you are interested in character, you can, as I did, skim the technical parts and focus on the heroism and skill of the pilots.

[Angelia Na · Rating 4 out of 5]

Book was informative.. interesting perspective. Skimmed through the technicalities of the mention of speed, angles and flaps..

My impression was Captain Scully was an immediate recognized hero.. didnt realized the emotional stress he had to go through with the various authorities..Dealing with these agencies could be even more stressful than the landing itself! And i could relate it to the corporate world where a problem where you did your best to solve with your best intentions turn against you instead.

I like the perpective on solving other root causes, lile birds perspective, air craft design etc...

I went to watch the movie Sully on Netflix immediately after the book.

[Tom Brennan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A rare and well-deserved five star review from me for Langewiesche's work here. Though a bit dated now, he gives us a solid book. Neither a puff piece nor a hit piece, it is a chronological retelling of the events of that day interspersed with fascinating explanations of how geese affect airplane engines, how fly by wire evolved, pilot training, water landings, and a variety of other pertinent context. More though, he manages to do that without losing the thread of his tale.

There are several tests of a great book. One is whether I actively seek out my next opportunity to pick it up again. This one passes that test. History by way of great storytelling.

[Richard · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mr. Langewiesche is a journalist who takes a close look at the events leading to the splashdown in the Hudson of US Airways flight 1549(both in the history of the airline industry and in the immediate lead-in and reactions of the crew and passengers to the emergency landing itself).

It's an informative look at the technology and engineering of passenger aircraft at the time and the politics involved. You come away with an appreciation of what Sullenberger and his crew actually did and the miracle that took place that day.

[Sharon Wishnow · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent research-based account of the miracle landing on the Hudson River. Langewiesche delves into the history well... everything related to plane crashes, the Airbus, pilots, and decision making. The actual details of the crash are minimal compared to the entire book. It's a short book but highly informative and full of wry humor. I appreciated how it discusses that though a major event is newsworthy it comes with its own pre and post history.

[Robert Hepple · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published in 2009, Fly by Wire gives a detailed account of the air accident that culminated in the landing of an Airbus A320 in the River Hudson. In fact, the detail is incredible in which the author not only looks at each step and contributory factor in the accident, but also looks at the background and history of each of those factors. Fascinating to read.

[Dane37 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Informative and Reassuring - A Quick Read

The author does a nice job making technical parts understandable without talking down to the reader. His coverage of human issues strikes a nice balance too. Sullenberger and, others too, are lauded but not deified. Still others are critiqued but not demonized. It’s a short book but then it was a short flight.

[Chad Rexin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thought this would be all about the flight of the Miracle on the Hudson, but while it was, it went deeper into the fly by wire and automatic systems and safeguards that many modern airliners have and in particular what Airbus has done to help make flight more safe and to aid the pilots in performing controls that would be close to impossible for a pilot to make on his or her own.

[Susan Bache Brewer · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really interesting little book about the nuances of modern day aviation. However, the main focus was US Airways Flight 1549 that experienced dual engine failure after hitting a flock of geese and having to ditch (intentional water landing) in the Hudson River. “Five minutes of flight. Four minutes until survival was assured. This book is the story of a short slice of life.” Credit to pilot Chelsey Sullenberger and crew.

[Elizabeth Cox · Rating 2 out of 5]

My gosh this was a slog.

"3:26 pm. At about that time a flock of Canada geese was flying at two thousand seven hundred feet southwest-bound over the Bronx in a loose echellon formation tending to business as usual with nothing special in mind." 🙄 This is actually a comparatively engaging sentence. Most of the book was a snooze-fest.

[Master Commander · Rating 4 out of 5]

Sone interesting points discussed regarding Airbus philosophy on flight controls and on bird culling. The author highlights two other accidents, in his effort to discuss Airbus fly-by-wire basics. I wanted to keep reading more on the evacuation process and passenger profiling. Overall good effort; tailored to a non aviation audience.

[ellen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Enjoyed the details about the Airbus’s engineering process and also Langewiesche’s classic anti-hero stuff - the focus on the passengers and flight attendants near the end was nice! - but also felt a bit rushed to wrap up at the end.

[Sally · Rating 4 out of 5]

Account of the Sullenberger Miracle on the Hudson and a lot of very interesting additional information on aviation safety and plane crashes. Rather chaotic organisation that feels like it would be better with more editing, but crescendos in a fascinating dissection of the Hudson landing.

[Kimball · Rating 3 out of 5]

*I will update my review and shelves later.*

[Maddie Mott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Langewiesche’s writing on aviation accidents is extremely readable and morbidly fascinating ... if perhaps not the thing to read before a trip.

[John Waits · Rating 5 out of 5]

Riveting stuff. Love Langeweische’s work.

[Karl · Rating 1 out of 5]

Off the subject book.

[Davey · Rating 4 out of 5]

NF - Miracle on Hudson, Sully - very interesting, focus on plane engineering

[Larry Coleman · Rating 1 out of 5]

It is both sad and frustrating that someone named Langewische would write such an uninspired and lazy book about such an inspiring subject, because Wolfgang Langewische (William's father) is famous in aviation circles as the man who wrote THE book on flying: "Stick and Rudder: An Explanation of the Art of Flying". (That book is so good that I named my aviation blog, "Keyboard and Rudder", after it.) In this case, the son definitely and unfortunately does not surpass the father.

The story almost writes itself: hero pilot saves the day and the crowd goes wild. Note that I said "almost writes itself". Apparently, based on the amount of effort William put into this book (or, more precisely, just how little work he put into it), he thinks it DOES write itself. This is not a finished book: this is just a pile of notes which is a good start on an ACTUAL book. There is a lot that should have gone into it, but William didn't do the hard writing work required to put into it.

But there is at least an equal amount of junk that did make it to the page that should have been cut during the first editing pass. There is gratuitous profanity not involved in part of a conversation but put there just to attempt to be clever or edgy. Swearing is sometimes a convenient shorthand in day to day life, but more often than not is just a cover for being too lazy to formulate a cogent statement. This is a minor quibble compared to some other major problems with the book, like long rants concerning William's personal philosophical beliefs on certain issues. I personally agree with him that the lifestyle and role of the airline captain is far removed from its glory days, but I'm reading this book to learn something new about a famous incident and I couldn't give a fuck less what he thinks about it: the facts alone are cool enough, so just give them to me and let me make up my own damn mind. (See what I did there: I can write just like him!)

There are other parts of the book which are just pure blatant filler designed to make the book look thick enough to charge money for. There are kids books with less whitespace between lines, and blank pages are appended to the end of each chapter just to add a dozen or so to the page count. What's even more annoying is William's sad trick--which is resorted to more than once--of doing what TVtropes would call "showing the work" but in the worst, least skillful way possible: just blandly listing a dozen or more so minute, pointless, and boring items in infodump format. For example, from page 54 we get this gem:

"The company handles the necessary paperwork, then goes out and handles squirrels, flying squirrels, raccoons, bats, moles, skunks, chipmunks, rats, mice, snakes, pigeons, opossums, voles, shrews, and, of course, Canada geese."

Feel like you're dealing with Shrimpin' Bubba from "Forrest Gump" yet? Do you think "The company handles the necessary paperwork and handles over a dozen different kinds of pests." might have been a wee bit better? But that's just a warmup for a tour de force in complete assholery just four pages later, which I'm not even going to bother to type in because it lists 31 (yes, that's not a typo: thirty-one!) different species of birds that have hit planes, then twists the boredom dagger a bit deeper by proceeding to list 15 MORE non-avian species! Ladies and gentlemen, THIS IS WHY EDITORS EXIST.

That is probably my biggest frustration with this book: it obviously wasn't edited beyond spell-check, but there are points where William shows that he can actually write well when he wants to. It is a good start to a book, and there are some points where the writing is excellent and shows flashes of the four- or five-star book this could have been with just some more work, but it is certainly not a finished product. Instead, this reeks of the laziness inherent in just jamming some pages between a cover to capitalize on the temporary fame of Chesley Sullenberger.