Soon after, Mr Sullenberger, aided by his co-pilot Jeffrey Skiles, glided the jet to a textbook touchdown in the Hudson River just off the shores of midtown Manhattan with no loss of life or serious injury for the 155 passengers and crew on board. But to Couric, the pilot reveals a glimpse of the fear he was feeling inside once the extraordinary severity of the situation had sunk in. As the plane angled towards the water, he said, he was overtaken by “the worst sickening, pit-of-your-stomach, falling-through-the-floor feeling,” he had ever had.