Many have heard the saying or phrase “fight or flight mode”, for Captain Sullenberger,

this was the exact situation he was put into on January 15, 2009. After what had occurred
many people thought the tragic flight accident was over and everything would turn back to
normal, but that was not the case. Captain Sully was still getting a lot of criticism on how he
handled the situation that went down. Captain Sully was called to testify to the NTSB (National
Transportation Safety Board), throughout his testimony he utilizes logos and ethos to defend
himself as a pilot who has much experience, but was put into a situation he never experienced
before did the best he could to land the plane, with over 155 passengers, safely.

It was a casual day on January 15, 2009 at LaGuardia airport, US Airways Flight 1549
traveling from New York City to Charlotte North Carolina had been struck with a flock of geese,
blowing out both engines and causing the plane to lose all engine power. Captain Sully was
forced to make a split-decision on how he wanted to safely land the plane, one of the choices
was to turn back to LaGuardia airport, but he felt that the plane would not have made it back to
the airport in the time they had left, so he then chose to land the plane in the Hudson river,
though it was not the best landing, it was the safest, and that day he saved all 155 souls on
board the aircraft.

After the incident, the NTSB was not satisfied with the landing and created their own
simulations of the exact events that took place, and were able to land the plane safely at the
LaGuardia airport. After the NTSB had this information, they then called Captain Sully to come
and testify to the NTSB as to why he landed the plane “incorrectly”.Captain Sully uses a lot
logos to defend his decisions to the NTSB. In the simulation, we can see that the airplane had
enough time to safely land back at the airport, but Captain Sully says, “No one warned us. No
one said, "You are going to lose both engines at a lower altitude than any jet in history. But, be
cool, just make a left turn for LaGuardia like you're going back to pick up the milk." This was
dual engine loss at 2800 feet followed by an immediate water landing with 155 souls on board.
No one has ever trained for an incident like that.”, he goes into further explanation saying, “I'd
like to know how many times the pilot practiced that maneuver before he actually pulled it off.
I'm not questioning the pilots; they're good pilots. But they've clearly been instructed to head
for the airport immediately after the bird strike. You've allowed no time for analysis or decision
making. In these simulations, you've taken all of the humanity out of the cockpit. How much
time did the pilots spend planning for this event, for these simulations? You are looking for
human error. Then make it human.” After Captain Sully says this, it puts the simulations and the
NTSB to shame, due to the fact that these simulations are computer-generated, not a real life
or death situation, or otherwise known as a “flight or flight situation”. It is effective because it
allows everyone to understand as to why you cannot compare a computer controlled
simulation, to an actual human being who has never been in that kind of situation. He uses
basic knowledge to compare how different the two situations are, one being a real life situation,
one being a computer-generated situation, which already had the exact directions of what to
do in this situation. This helps other to side with him even more in his testimony, or argument.

Another effective rhetorical strategy he uses was egos, giving not only himself but his
whole crew team credibility that helped him to land the plane. For example, David, one of the
board members says, “I’d like to add something on a personal note. I can say with absolute
confidence that, after speaking with the rest of the flight crew, with bird experts, aviation
engineers, after running through every scenario, after interviewing each player, there is still an X
in this result. And it’s you, Captain Sullenberger. Remove you from the equation and the math
just fails.” but Captain Sully continues to say, “I disagree. It wasn’t just me. It was all of us. It
was Jeff and Donna and Sheila and Doreen and all of the passengers, the rescue workers, the
air traffic control, and ferryboat crews, and the scuba cops. We all did it. We survived.” Though,
many see Captain Sully as the hero, which gives him credibility that he is a trusted pilot, he
disagrees with David, and says it was a team work act, and not solely him. This gives him
credibility to not only him, but credibility to the whole flight crew as well, allowing people to
also understand that these pilots and attendees did the best they could to protect everyone on
that plane, which only advances his testimony, or argument.

In closing, we see Captain Sully effectively use logos and ethos in order to defend
himself when he testifies to the NTSB about the events of went down on January 15, 2009.
Many people everyday use rhetorical strategies but don’t know it, such as politicians, lawyers,
and even pilots! Though, knowing these strategies and how to use them, you will be able to
defend a certain point of view in a situation pretty well, just like Captain Sullenberger.