CHARLOTTE, N.C. — A reunion was held in Charlotte Tuesday with the 155 people who survived the miracle landing on the Hudson River 10 years ago.
Their lives were spared when Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger safely splash-landed Flight 1549 after a bird strike.
[Crew, passengers in Charlotte celebrate 10 years after 'Miracle on the Hudson']
Channel 9 reporter Mark Becker spoke with some of the passengers Tuesday in uptown Charlotte.
“There is just a tremendous life responsibility, thinking your life has ended and all of a sudden, it is not,” Vallie Collins said.
Collins was in the last row of the plane, which was the part that hit the river first and the hardest. She quickly found the icy water rising to her chest.
Collins and everyone else on that flight survived.
“I was lucky,” Carl Bazarian said. “I was one of the first people off and the four of us, we formed a human chain to the raft, literally. It was women and children on first.”
There were many heroes that day onboard Flight 1549.
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“It took us 40 years to become overnight sensations,” Sullenberger said.
Sullenberger gave credit to his co-pilot Jeffery Skiles and to the training that had prepared them for something they could never have expected to confront that day.
Ten years later, everyone reminisced at the reunion in Charlotte.
“It really is amazing,” Collins said.
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