Half of the Miracle on the Hudson flight crew was back in the water on the weekend but Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger didn’t get his feet wet this time. Sullenberger was walking down a street in Vancouver, British Columbia, taking in the sights of the Olympic city when Darren Batstone, a pilot for Harbour Air, recognized him. One thing led to another and soon Sullenberger was aboard Batstone’s turbine-powered de Havilland Otters on floats that Harbour Air uses for scheduled service between Vancouver’s Burrard Inlet and the inner harbor of Victoria, about 50 miles across Georgia Strait on Vancouver Island.
Sullenberger was the captain of US Airways Flight 1549 when the Airbus A320 lost power in both engines, necessitating a ditching in the Hudson River in January of 2009. The most serious injury was a broken leg. It’s not known if he had any pointers for Batstone, who has to keep an eye out for marine traffic as well as other aircraft in the busy harbor areas of B.C.’s largest cities.
