US Airways Flight 1549 was a regularly scheduled US Airways flight from New York City (LaGuardia Airport), to Charlotte and Seattle, in the United States. On January 15, 2009, the Airbus A320 serving the flight struck a flock of birds shortly after take-off from LaGuardia, losing all engine power. Given their position in relation to the available airports and their low altitude, pilots Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger and Jeffrey Skiles decided to glide the plane to ditching in the Hudson River off Midtown Manhattan. All 155 people on board were rescued by nearby boats, with only a few serious injuries. The media quickly dubbed this water landing of a powerless jetliner with no deaths "the Miracle on the Hudson" and a National Transportation Safety Board official described it as "the most successful ditching in aviation history". Though the Board found the ditching could have been avoided by returning to LaGuardia, it affirmed the ditching as providing the highest probability of survival, given the circumstances.: 137 The pilots and flight attendants were awarded the Master's Medal of the Guild of Air Pilots and Air Navigators in recognition of their "heroic and unique aviation achievement". The incident was dramatized in the 2016 film Sully, starring Tom Hanks as Sullenberger. From Wikipedia
