US Air flight crashes into Hudson River.

[Moonliner]

US Airways passengers get $5,000 each; is it enough?

Many US Airways (LCC) passengers who endured a crash landing in the Hudson River 12 days ago say they appreciate the $5,000 that the airline has offered — but some say it's not enough.
Joe Hart, a salesman from Charlotte who suffered a bloody nose and bruises, says he "would like to be made whole for the incident."

It was good for US Airways to reimburse passengers for the cost of the flight and lost luggage, but in this case I don't see why they should be on the hook for more than that.

The accident was caused by an act of God type thing and the crew from all accounts performed admirably. Yeah it sucks to be on a plane that lands in a river but I don't see how US Airways is responsible for your emotional trauma.

It's not clear from the article, perhaps Joe is just asking for the medical costs of patching up his nose but it reads like he's looking for a lottery type payday.

[Kevy Baby]

It wasn't a crash, it was an unscheduled water landing.

[BarTopDancer]

Video (I'm sure YouTube has more)

[SzczerbiakManiac]

Near as I can tell, this is not the fault of US Air. In fact, by all accounts their employees performed admirably in this situation. If US Air decides they want to offer a goodwill "present" to their affected customers, those customers ought not look that horse in the mouth.

[~MS~]

Well it had to happen, instead of being grateful they were on a flight with the most experienced crew they could hope for and basically walked away from what in any other circumstance would have been catastrophic someone is going to file lawsuits. I'd venture to say they won't be successful, but all it takes is a lawyer willing to file the claim ....and then hope to settle out of court. I hope US airways holds firm, cover any medical that is a direct result of the landing, replace lost belongings, which in MOST cases I'd say $5,000 should do unless it was special circumstances and someone had some high end camera or electronics in their luggage ..and they can't lie about it because most of the luggage was recovered, it's ruined but they have it.

[Ghoulish Delight]

There is one unanswered question that may put some liability on US Air.

A bird strike should not bring down a jet liner. Geese are big, and perhaps it was just an unlucky hit in just the right place at just the right time. But the engine in question had just had work done (replaced air compressor if I recall) a week earlier. So it may be that the work wasn't done right which left the engine unable to withstand a strike that it would normally survive.

That said, anyone asking for anything beyond minor compensatory settlement (I think a handful of free tickets is a fair price) for anyone walking away with minor injuries is a greedy whore.

[Alex]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

A bird strike should not bring down a jet liner.

Is this correct? I can't find it with a quick search but a Slate article after it happened said that jet engines are rated to functionally survive bird impacts up to a certain weight (4 pounds I think) and that geese are generally above that weight.

So if that's correct*, the poor luck of having geese hit all engines might reasonably be expected to bring the plane down.

Regardless of liability I would expect, though, plenty of lawsuits and if the plaintiffs are somewhat reasonable in their greed plenty of settlements.

[Moonliner]

Originally Posted by Ghoulish Delight

There is one unanswered question that may put some liability on US Air.

A bird strike should not bring down a jet liner. Geese are big, and perhaps it was just an unlucky hit in just the right place at just the right time. But the engine in question had just had work done (replaced air compressor if I recall) a week earlier. So it may be that the work wasn't done right which left the engine unable to withstand a strike that it would normally survive.

That said, anyone asking for anything beyond minor compensatory settlement (I think a handful of free tickets is a fair price) for anyone walking away with minor injuries is a greedy whore.

From the descriptions I heard here, it was not so much a bird strike as a flock strike affecting both engines. One report stated that engines are rated to withstand a hit from a bird up to 5 lbs. Geese are significantly larger than that.

We know the engine still attached to the plane had "organic" matter in it. As long as the second engine has bird goo as well I think US Air is in the clear.