If you think you know the story of Chesley Sullenberger's miraculous ditching of US Airways flight 1549 from the major media coverage, think again. In this short, tightly written yet expansive book, Vanity Fair correspondent Langewiesche (The Atomic Bazaar) weaves a page-turning narrative of the ill-fated, three-minute flight, crippled by a bird strike, with several finely honed elements of backstory (the day-to-day lives of airline personnel including Capt. "Sully" Sullenberger and his crew, an errant flock of geese, and a controversial French-built airplane) into a masterpiece of modern journalism. While most media coverage of the event has focused on Sullenberger's heroic actions, dubbing it the "Miracle on the Hudson," Langewiesche eschews such hyperbole and explores every detail of the day's fateful events. Sullenberger and his copilot, Jeffrey Skiles, do come off as heroic, but more for what they did not do—they did not panic, and they did not interfere with the Airbus A320's remarkable computer system controlling the airplane's glide into the Hudson. Just before impact, however, Sullenberger raised the airplanes nose gently, an action that bought time for all the passengers to escape the frigid waters. The sections of the book dealing with the flight itself are soberly rendered, yet gripping. But it is the backstory—including the economic, political, and engineering stories behind the airplane itself—that make this book a true achievement. In this expertly researched book, rendered in spare, pitch-perfect prose, Langewiesche has turned a feel-good tabloid story into an enduring work of literature.” —Publishers Weekly
“The flight lasted for not much more time than it will take you to read this review. A minute and a half after takeoff, the US Airways jet engines ingested several geese and failed. A little over three minutes later, Capt. Chesley 'Sully' Sullenberger gracefully planted the Airbus 320 in the Hudson River, and everyone was rescued.
A short tale to hang an entire book on, but William Langewiesche is the best man for the job. "Fly by Wire: The Geese, the Glide, the Miracle on the Hudson" isn't a hero's story, with inspirational details from Sullenberger's life. Instead, Langewiesche gives us an insightful analysis of the changing world of commercial aviation.
As an author, Vanity Fair magazine editor and pilot, Langewiesche knows this territory well, and he approaches it with a sense of humor. There's a cleverly researched chapter about goose behavior near airports, including an explanation of the avian term "cluster-flocking." Langewiesche relies on cockpit transcripts, interviews and aircraft systems data to flesh out the minutest details surrounding the brief flight. You'll learn what Sullenberger ate for breakfast that morning and what movie his co-pilot watched the night before.” —Phaedre Hise, San Francisco Chronicle
“A gripping, frightening and essential story.” —John Freeman, The Denver Post, on The Atomic Bazaar
“One need read only the first three pages of The Atomic Bazaar to be reminded of William Langewiesche's formidable talent as a journalist whose cool, precise and economical reporting is harnessed to an invigorating moral and intellectual perspective on the world he describes . . . An important book.” —Jonathan Raban, The New York Times Book Review, on The Atomic Bazaar
“Astonishing . . . As [Langewiesche] demonstrates time and time again in this brave, often electrifying book, [the sea] is a world that is both new and very old, and we ignore it at our peril.” —Nathaniel Philbrick, The New York Times Book Review, on The Outlaw Sea
“William Langewiesche's enthralling study of the epidemic disorder of our oceans is hard to put down. His prose flows seamlessly and elegantly, effortlessly integrating investigative reporting, political analysis, travel writing and even film criticism.” —Jesse Berrett, San Francisco Chronicle Book Review, on The Outlaw Sea
“Slim but powerful . . . One of the gifts of American Ground [is] truth, unclouded by sentiment. This book's other gift is its capacity to surprise: it is a work of original reporting, and its pages are filled with astonishing observations.” —Jeffrey Goldberg, The New York Times Book Review, on American Ground
“Extraordinary . . . An amazing piece of journalism, full of colorful characters and astonishing scenes.” —Peter Carlson, The Washington Post, on American Ground
As in American Ground, his 2002 account of the cleanup at the World Trade Center site, Langewiesche is less interested in human drama than in clinical analysis…No doubt, brave pilots like Sullenberger and Skiles deserve hero worship. But Langewiesche makes a convincing case for the valiant A320. The enduring image will be of its drifting nose-high in the icy Hudson, "refusing to die."
—The New York Times Book Review
Fly by Wire is not just about Chesley Sullenberger…Mr. Langewiesche uses Flight 1549 as the pretext for a smart, confident, wide-ranging discussion of commercial aviation…He painstakingly reconstructs what happened that January day on Flight 1549, and spends a good deal of time talking about the damage birds can do to an aircraft. He writes about how the National Transportation Safety Board goes about its work, and about the physics of gliding. The book is also filled with hair-raising stories of other flights in peril, the kind of thing Mr. Langewiesche writes about as well as anyone alive. He is so familiar with airplanes that his descriptions of how they work are simple and revelatory.
—The New York Times
Much more than a straight retelling of U.S. Airways flight 1549's miraculous landing on the Hudson, Langewiesche's latest uses the story—and the heroism of pilots Chesley Sullenberger and Jeffrey Skiles—as a lens through which to examine the advances in and flaws of modern air travel and piloting. David Drummond delivers a solid reading, relaying the detail-laden text—the backstories of the pilots, the technical information, the gripping blow-by-blow—with clarity and careful pacing. A subtle performance that enhances and never overwhelms the material. A Farrar, Straus & Giroux hardcover (Reviews, Nov. 9). (Jan.)
Flying "by wire" refers to relegating the control of an airplane to its computers. Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger's successful landing of an Airbus on the Hudson River in January of 2009 after losing all engine thrust showcases the electronic safety built into new passenger planes. Suspense waxes and wanes as the story of that brief flight becomes interrupted by detours to related information. With inflection and timing, narrator David Drummond turns the playbacks of other less fortunate flights into thrilling nail-biters. His delivery of the dialogue spoken during government investigations and between crew members during critical moments imparts a clear separation of speakers. At first, Drummond seems as unadorned and American as they come, but he takes some hilarious liberties with British accents in his renditions of background episodes. J.A.H. © AudioFile 2010, Portland, Maine
