By now I’m sure everyone has heard the news from the Hudson River. What an amazing feat the crew of this aircraft accomplished.

An Airbus A320 weighs 169,000 lbs. The pilots had to fly “dead stick” Imagine trying to steer your car or truck with 100 lb weights tied to each wrist.

Having served in the Air Force, I was the crew chief for an McDonnell Douglas F-15E fighter jet. On rare occasions, I flew in the rear seat and on even rarer occasions I was treated to the stick.

One of the skills I learned was engine run up. This involved actually starting the aircraft engines after they had been worked on to ensure they functioned properly. This training was every year. For the ten minutes I had the engine running, I spent 5 hours in a classroom and 10 or more in a F-15 simulator. We trained for ground engine fires, explosions and electrical failures.

As a pilot, for every hour spent in the air, thousands were spent on the ground training.

TRAINING is the reason these people survived.

If your looking to defend your agency in a court of law, training will prove you know what, when and how to do it.

If you need to draw your weapon and save a life including your own, train to do this.

Training can be as simple as recalling an incident that went well or bad.

Train…like your going to do it in the street!

Train…like someones life depends on it…it does

Train…like your life depends on it …it might!

Don’t look to scrimp on the training budget!!!

As for the geese….sucks to be them…bad karma!!

I got your back..I know you have mine…

Steve

Update: MP3 of Flight 1549, Box 868



Posted by Steve on January 16, 2009 | Permalink & Trackback