Highest Duty_ My Search for What Really Matters - Chesley B. Sullenberger [95]
In the hour or two that followed, three more doctors came in. They didn’t really have any medical reason for stopping by. They probably were just curious to get a look at us, given that we were all over the news. At one point, a doctor in his mid-forties stopped in and looked me right in the eye. I could tell that he was trying to get the measure of me, trying to figure out what made me tick. He didn’t say a word for fifteen or twenty seconds. Finally he spoke. “You’re so calm,” he said. “It’s incredible.” He was mistaken. I didn’t feel calm at all. At that point, I was feeling numb and out of sorts. I just couldn’t relax until I knew the count was 155.
Finally, at 7:40 P.M., more than four hours after we landed in the Hudson, Captain Arnie Gentile, a union rep, came in and gave me the word. “It’s official,” he said.
I felt the most intense feeling of relief I’d ever felt in my life. I felt like the weight of the universe had been lifted off of my heart. I probably let out a long breath. I’m not sure I smiled. I was too spent to celebrate.
It had been the most harrowing day of my life, but I was incredibly grateful for this ending. We hadn’t saved the Airbus 320. That was ruined. But the people on the plane, they would be returning to their families. All of them.
16
STORIES HEARD, LIVES TOUCHED
I AM USED to it now.
I open a letter and five one-dollar bills fall out. “Mr. Sullenberger, Great job! I’d like to buy you a beer, albeit a cheap domestic one.”
A fax arrives: “In this crazy world, it’s good to know that chance still favors the prepared mind. Good job, Captain!”
A letter comes with an illustration of Snoopy in an exhilarated dance pose. The caption: “Oh Happy Day!” The letter writer is a woman from New Jersey. “We on the East Coast are still scarred by 9/11. It seemed all in the tristate area lost a family member, a friend, a neighbor, a coworker. Your splash in the river made us feel elated, serene, and happy!”
I have gotten thousands of messages such as these since Flight 1549. I have received ten thousand e-mails from people who tracked down my safety consulting business online. Another five thousand e-mails arrived at my personal e-mail address. I don’t know much about Facebook, but my kids tell me I have more than 635,000 fans there.
I’ve heard from people on every continent except Antarctica. And almost every time I’m at the mall or in a restaurant, strangers come up to say they don’t mean to bother me, but they just want to say thank you.
While a few of these correspondents had loved ones or friends on Flight 1549, the vast majority did not. What happened on that airplane touched them deeply enough that they felt compelled to reach out to me and my family. Some tell me that after hearing about our flight, they found themselves reflecting on a seminal moment in their own lives or thinking about a person who inspired them. Others ended up reviewing the dreams they had for their children or feeling renewed grief about losses they’re still trying to understand.
I have become a recipient of people’s reflections because I am now the public face of an unexpectedly uplifting moment that continues to resonate. Hearing from so many people, paying attention to their stories—that’s part of my new job.
I’ve come to see their thankfulness as a generous gift, and I don’t want to diminish their kind words by denying them. Though it made me uncomfortable at first, I’ve made a decision to graciously accept people’s thanks. At the same time I don’t strive to take it as my own. I recognize that I have been given a role to play, and maybe some good can happen as a result.
It’s not a role that I had ever