- CHARLOTTE, North Carolina: Nearly 2 ½ years after a US Airways jet made a miraculous landing on the Hudson River, passengers and crew will reunite in the North Carolina city where the aircraft was bound that wintry day.
The damaged aircraft has spent the last two years in a Newark, New Jersey hangar.
The Airbus A320 airplane left New Jersey on June 6 in a special trailer to the Carolinas Aviation Museum in Charlotte for display. A June 11 reception there will honor passengers and crew.
Charlotte was the destination of US Airways Flight 1549 until a flock of geese disabled the engines on Jan. 15, 2009 minutes after takeoff at the LaGuardia Airport in New York. Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger III, a veteran fighter jet pilot, glided it to a safe landing on the Hudson outside New York City.
All 155 passengers and crew members were rescued. By the time rescuers on board Coast Guard boats came, some passengers were standing on the wing of the plane, which was submerged up to its windows.