Marilyn Ogg watched news coverage last month of pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger's successful ditching of a commercial airliner in the Hudson River, a passenger praised Sullenberger for being the first to ever pull off such a maneuver.
"I thought, That's not correct,'" Ogg said. "I almost e-mailed."
She would know. More than 50 years ago, her father saved all 31 passengers aboard Pan Am Flight 943 when he ditched a Boeing 377 Stratocruiser in the Pacific Ocean.
Capt. Richard Ogg was midway through a flight from Honolulu to San Francisco on Oct. 16, 1956, when, in the wee hours of the morning, the No. 1 engine began to sputter. Shortly after, the No. 4 engine failed, leaving the plane with just two.
The Stratocruiser was losing altitude. It wouldn't make it to San Francisco or back to Honolulu. Ogg had to ditch.
About 3:30 a.m. Pacific time Oct. 16, as the plane passed over the empty heart of the Pacific Ocean, Capt. Ogg, 42, a pilot for 15 years at Pan Am, turned on the plane's PA system.
"Sorry to wake you up," he told his passengers.
"We have developed engine trouble and may have to ditch."
Like Sullenberger, who saved all 155 people aboard his US Airways jetliner, Ogg and his crew stayed calm. Fortune would have it that a Coast Guard cutter, the Pontchartrain, was nearby. Ogg circled the ship for four hours as he burned heavy fuel and waited for daylight.
"We will try to stay aloft until daylight," he said over the radio.
More here...
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment