The heroics of America's most unflappable pilot are to be brought to the big screen, in the safe hands of Clint Eastwood.
The veteran director is set to direct 'Miracle on the Hudson', which will tell the extraordinary tale of how Captain Chesley Sullenberger - 'Sully' - brought a commercial plane to rest safely in New York's Hudson river, saving the lives of all 155 passengers.
Chesley Sullenberger's safe landing of Flight 1549 in the Hudson River made him a worldwide hero
Audio and video recordings of the incident when the plane he was flying lost both of its engines, reveal Chesley to remain utterly calm and unruffled throughout the incident when, one by one, his options of landing the plane on land disappeared. Eventually, he announced he would be landing the plane on the water, and emergency services were able to scramble in time to reach the passengers. Chesley even walked up and down the plane himself twice to check no one was left behind, before being the last to leave his doomed aircraft.
Chesley says now of the big screen project, set to start filming in the autumn and based on his memoir, "I am very glad my story is in the hands of gifted storyteller and filmmaker Clint Eastwood, and veteran producers Allyn Stewart and Frank Marshall.
"The project could not have found a better home than Warner Bros. Pictures. This is truly a dream team."
155 passengers were safely rescued from the aircraft, with Chesley the last to leave the plane
Clint Eastwood's most recent film was 'American Sniper'. It starred Bradley Cooper as Chris Kyle, the US Navy Seals' most deadly marksman, who returned from the Gulf War with post-traumatic stress disorder, and set about helping other veterans before he was killed by another disturbed soldier. The film was Oscar-nominated and one of the year's biggest films at the box office, but also controversial for its depiction of the Gulf war.