The Gospel Coalition

Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger is a hero. He has been hailed as such from coast-to-coast and from pole-to-pole. He is, as you probably know, the man who piloted Flight 1549, the ill-fated US Airways flight that departed from New York and landed moments later in the nearby Hudson River. In a remarkable feat of airmanship, Sullenberger landed an eighty-ton commercial airliner in a river so successfully that all 155 passengers and crew were able to escape largely unscathed. There were no deaths and only a handful of injuries. The story gripped the nation and Sullenberger was soon making appearances in just every major media outlet. He was a true hero.

Or that’s what everyone says. While I would never want to discount just how remarkable a pilot he must be to land a crippled jet in a river and to do so near-perfectly so that everyone survived, I wonder if this actually exalts him to hero status. When I think of a hero, I think of a person who rushes into danger, not a person who has it thrust upon him. A man who sees another person fall onto the subway tracks, who jumps down onto the tracks and holds the person down while a subway passes overhead–that is a hero. But a person flying a plane and doing a remarkable job of it, isn’t he just doing his job? So is Captain Sullenberger a hero? I am inclined to say that we have to stretch the word just a little bit to apply it to him. Judging by what he says in Highest Duty I suspect that he would be inclined to agree.

When we heard about Flight 1549 in January 2009, we knew that a book could not possibly be far behind. And sure enough, less than 10 months after the events of that day, it has arrived. It is a memoir written by Sullenberger and coauthored by Jeffrey Zaslow who also coauthored the mega-selling The Last Lecture (which makes me wonder, what do you call the co-author of a memoir? “Ghost writer” does not quite seem to fit…). It is, of course, the story of Sullenberger’s life. The thing is, his life has been remarkably unremarkable. Like most of us, he has lived a very quiet and otherwise unexceptional life. But somehow this does not keep the book from extending to some 339 pages which really has to be at least 100 pages too long. As I read I could almost hear in the background the voice of an editor saying to Zaslow, “Look, statistics show that a book of 300 pages sells 27% better than a book of 200 pages. So you’ve got some work to do. Ask him if he’s ever baked a batch of muffins and write about that!” And so, for example, there is a chapter about his humanitarian efforts which include helping to train guide dogs, showing a passenger where to find his luggage and, one time at least, making a phone call on behalf of another person. There are a few chapters like this which really seem unnecessary “fluff”–things so very normal and unremarkable that they seem to be there only for the sake of taking up a few more pages. Yawn.

Notably absent in the book, at least to a Christian reader, is any mention of God. I found myself waiting for Sullenberger to eventually say something about God’s hand in the events of that day. But it never comes. I wouldn’t say this is a weak point in the book and Sullenberger is certainly under no obligation to acknowledge God as his copilot on that day. Yet this really was notable in its absence and especially so in America where such situations tend to turn so quickly to a kind of gratitude to God.

Highest Duty is at its best when it is giving a Captain’s-eye view of the events of January 15, 2009. In those moments, the book is quite riveting, especially to a person who, like me, really enjoys reading about airlines and airline disasters (kind of a morbid preoccupation, I know. Any other fans out there of the series Mayday?). But there is a lot to read before you come to this. Before that are many, many pages of rather unremarkable filler. I still enjoyed reading the book and have no great beef with it–it’s just that it does not make for the most enthralling reading.

Verdict: Wait for the paperback