On Fri, 16 Jan 2009 06:21:53 -0800, Smitty Two
wrote:

In article ,
willshak wrote:

on 1/16/2009 5:51 AM (ET) Jimw wrote the following:
Off Topic, but hardware related.

It's been all over the news about the plane that crashed into a river
in (I think) New York.

In the Hudson River by NYC. It is considered a crash, but because of the
expertise of the pilot, it was more of a landing in the water.

It is only "considered a crash" by the media. Pilots call that an
"off-field landing." A plane crashes when structural failure or pilot
error causes the plane to no longer be under the control of the pilot.
This was not the case, here.

As far as the pilot being a hero, sure, he did a nice job. Any pilot
could have easily done the same thing. Planes fly perfectly well without
engine power. Only caveat is, they fly a descending course.



They said it was caused by birds flying into
the engine. Then they showed a report of the number of bird caused
plane accidents and deaths each year. From 1990 to 2007 there were
almost 80,000 accidents caused by birds. There have been numerous
deaths and millions of dollars of damages.

OK, looking at the engines they showed on tv, I immediately thought
***Why dont they put some sort of screening over the engine***
It would only seem like a couple hundred dollars worth of hardware
cloth would solve the problem. Why dont they think of simple
solutions like this?

Jim

And the airbus is inherently unstable and is virtually unflyable
without the assistance of the flight computers. It is "fly by wire".

Good thing he still had electrical power or it would have ended a LOT
worse.