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Another case of impressive flying
Story here. 1956. A four engine stratocruiser, flying from Hawaii to San Francisco, loses two engines midway, has to ditch in mid-ocean. Capt. Richard Ogg pulls it off and gets everyone out alive. Video of the landing at the bottom.
Hat tip to Peter Buxton.
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Glad to see my old ship get some press. USCGC PONTCHARTRAIN (WHEC 70).
No, I wasn't assigned to her at that time, but it was a legendary part of her history. She, along with most of the Pacific Area High Endurance cutters, pulled "Ocean Station" duty in those days and she was at Ocean Station "November" at the time of that incident. "November" was located at 30N 140W, just about halfway between Honolulu and San Francisco. Duties were to provide navigational assistance via radar information, and to be there for just such an emergency.
The Ocean Station program was started during WWII to support trans-Pacific flights, and discontinued in 1973, because the development of high speed jet passenger aircraft and the improved navigational technology made them less cost effective.
PONTCHARTRAIN's skipper for the 1956 rescue was CAPT Bill Earle.
A real-life demonstration of the heroism/professionalism written about by Ernest K. Gann in his novel (and later movie) "The High and The Mighty".
Yet it is a very uncommon event for a jet airliner - intentionally landing on the water. This website has a summary of known commercial airliner ditchings since 1960.....and only one was what I'd call a success, the one in January.
http://www.airsafe.com/events/ditch.htm
And unintentional landings in water (water crashes) are far, far less successful.