Another article from the Boston Globe:
Pilot ill, passenger lands plane
. .By Peter Demarco, Globe Correspondent, 2/10/2002
The pilot had passed out, the radio was nothing but static, and the Provincetown runway, if Melanie Oswalt could find it in the darkness, was only 3,500 feet long.
Roger Carchrie-Feltus of Hyannis and two other passengers aboard Cape Air Flight 55 from Martha's Vineyard to Hyannis on Friday night gripped their seats, unable to help.
Somehow, Oswalt, a 24-year-old security trainer for the airline, who had hitched a ride home from work, remained calm as she leaped into the copilot's seat and took the controls.
She had taken only 50 hours of flying lessons and did not have her pilot's license, and the 10-seat Cessna 402 was more complicated than anything she had flown.
Carchrie-Feltus, 53, was unaware of Oswalt's minimal flight training. He called his wife on his cellphone just moments before it went dead. ''We're going to end up in the Atlantic Ocean or a tree somewhere,'' he said.
The flight, which left Martha's Vineyard at 7:10 p.m., normally takes about 15 minutes, but the plane had been in the air for almost a half hour when Oswalt took command as the unidentified pilot became incapacitated. She struggled with the pilot for control of the plane until the other passengers grabbed him and he passed out.
She had never landed a plane with retractable landing gear and the plane's wheels were in the up position. But she was undaunted.
''She was talking with [the airline] on her cellphone,'' said Richard Bunker, a plane crash investigator for the Massachusetts Aeronautics Commission. ''At one point, somebody asked if she felt comfortable she could land the airplane. She said yes, she could. Then they lost contact.''
The plane had gone off course and descended to just 300 feet altitude near Chatham Light when Oswalt came to the rescue, Carchrie-Feltus said. She brought the plane up to about 1,000 feet, then headed to Provincetown's unmanned airport, where she had received some flight training in the past.
Approaching Provincetown, she leveled the wings and killed the throttle, as she was trained to do, putting the plane down on its belly for a bumpy - but safe - landing.
''We landed with a big thump,'' said Carchrie-Feltus, ''and came to a screeching halt really quickly.'' The passengers opened an emergency hatch and ran from the plane.
By 8 p.m. or so, it was all over. The pilot was on his way to Cape Cod Hospital for treatment of a still undisclosed ailment, and the passengers Oswalt delivered to safety were calling her a hero.
''I really felt we had a higher power on our side,'' said Carchrie-Feltus, who took flowers to Oswalt's home yesterday as he delivered his thanks. ''Melanie had planned to go to Nantucket that night and 15 minutes before the flight, she decided to go to Hyannis.''
Others also offered praise for Oswalt's deeds.
''She basically saved five lives,'' said Bunker. ''This has happened before, but frankly, in the almost 18 years I've been doing this, this is the first time I've had a passenger land a plane.''
Bunker said the plan had minimal damage, considering the circumstances.
''She just took over,'' said Michelle Haynes, spokeswoman for Cape Air. ''It was like something out of one of those airplane movies. You always think, `What if I had to take over the controls?' She did.''
Haynes said Oswalt, of West Yarmouth, did not want to make a big deal out of her actions and preferred not to speak with reporters. Attempts by the Globe to reach her were unsuccessful.
Joe Borneo, a Bridgewater State College student who was in the Alpha Eta Rho aviation fraternity there with Oswalt, doubted he could have landed the plane even though he has logged 60 hours of air time.
''The plane she landed versus the planes we train in - it's like driving a Ford Probe all your life and going to a Mack truck,'' he said.
As a reward, Haynes said, Oswalt will be given free lessons by Cape Air, with the hope that she'll become a licensed pilot one day. The passengers on board will also be offered free flights, she said.
The incident is under investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration.