could this dude BE any cooler?

nope. he is THE coolest person on earth

Hero pilot Chesley (Sully) Sullenberger sweats lost book
BY BILL HUTCHINSON
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
He has nerves of steel, but hero pilot Chesley (Sully) Sullenberger is jittery about an overdue library book.

Living up to his squeaky clean image, the US Airways captain has informed his hometown library that he may not be able to return a borrowed book - about ethics, of all things.

The former fighter pilot has a good excuse: The book was lost when he was forced to make a splash landing on the frigid Hudson River last month.

Sullenberger and co-pilot Jeffrey Skiles have been credited with saving themselves and 153 passengers and crew.

Officials at the Danville, Calif., library revealed that the flying ace rang them up saying the book is still in the crashed airliner's cargo hold and could he get an extension and a waiver on overdue fees.

The book had been borrowed from the Fresno State University library.

Peter McDonald, dean of library services at Fresno State, said he was bowled over by Sully's sense of responsibility. ........

sully's family (bein' all proud and what not)

and HUMBLE too ya know!

the more i hear abut him, the more of a hero i really do think he is. man, i don't fly (well) and i'm warning you now, if you ever see me in an airport line, ask if you can cut ahead of me. you DO NOT want to be in back of me while i attempt to get through the metal detector (it DOESN'T WORK). i have to be wanded (and sometimes more).

BUT

i'd fly with sully ANY day-um day
Pilot's wife: 'We are very proud of him'
Praise pours in for Sullenberger after he safely lands plane in Hudson River
msnbc.com staff and news service reports
NEW YORK - The wife of the cool-headed pilot who safely landed a crippled jetliner in the Hudson River said Friday she was stunned to hear about the ordeal from her husband after it was all over.

"Suffice to say, it was a shock, like it was to everyone," Lorrie Sullenberger said. ...

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

i just want to send a shout out

to the pilot (Chesley B. Sullenberger III,) and crew of the us airways jet that landed in the hudson yesterday. wow.

a shout out to the passengers as well. from accounts i've read, they helped each other and made sure all were safe

and another shout out to the boats that came VERY quickly to the aid of that downed plane as well as ALL of the rescue personnel.

it was freezing cold in the northeast yesterday. all i kept thinking about were all of those people in the water.

thank the goddess no lives were lost

All 155 Escape Jet’s Plunge Into Hudson
By ROBERT D. McFADDEN
A US Airways jetliner with 155 people aboard lost power in both engines, possibly from striking birds, after taking off from La Guardia Airport on Thursday afternoon. The pilot ditched in the icy Hudson River and all on board were rescued by a flotilla of converging ferries and emergency boats, the authorities said. What might have been a catastrophe in New York — one that evoked the feel if not the scale of the Sept. 11 attack — was averted by a pilot’s quick thinking and deft maneuvers, and by the nearness of rescue boats, a combination that witnesses and officials called miraculous.

As stunned witnesses watched from high-rise buildings on both banks, the Airbus A320, which had risen to 3,200 feet over the Bronx and banked left, came downriver, its fuselage lower than many apartment terraces and windows, in a carefully executed touchdown shortly after 3:30 p.m. that sent up huge plumes of water at midstream, between West 48th Street in Manhattan and Weehawken, N.J. ...........

photo:

Passengers stood on the wings as they awaited rescue.

Photo: Gary Hershorn/Reuters

photo:

The scene in the Hudson River.

Photo: Josh Haner/The New York Times