Originally Posted by
HarryMann
2. calm water and free of obstacles
9. unlimited runway length
This is not normally the case on the Hudson River.
a) Normally the ferry and shipping traffic, and terrain, make it a pretty choppy, windy place, with a lot of traffic about, particularly where the aircraft reportedly landed.
b) Quite often there are large fuel oil and natural gas barges moored where the aircraft landed, any where south of Battery Park there are even more barges and ships moored (it is NY
HARBOUR, after all), and South of that is the Verrazano Bridge.
All in all,
a lot of factors came together, on the positive side, in this instance.
The coordination of all the subsequent rescue attempt shows strides of improvement since 9/11. Well done to all.