Miracle On the Hudson Plane Anchored In At Charlotte’s Sullenberger Aviation Museum

CHARLOTTE – Big things are landing in Charlotte at the Sullenberger Aviation Museum, previously know as the Carolina’s Aviation Museum. It’s getting set to re-open in the summer of 2024.

Stephen Saucier is the president of the museum and gave WCCB’s Emma Mondo a tour of the site’s progress; the biggest spectacle being the ‘Miracle on the Hudson’ plane.

The passenger jet that landed in the Hudson River on January 15th, 2009. The museum received it in 2010, and had in on display until they closed their doors at the Carolina Aviation Museum in 2019.

The museum team was able to move it from that storage, and put it in its final resting place; in the heart of the main hanger.

They did this with the help of a company called J. Supor and Sons, a new jersey rigging company that originally pulled the plane out of the Hudson River and brought it to North Carolina in 2010.

“We brought them down here again, they have special equipment to bring the fuselage over, we first put that in place, then we put the wings back in place with the stands that you see underneath, and then we put the tails on,” said Saucier. 

While the A320 airbus is a huge piece to this exhibit other changes are coming as well. The historic hanger originally built in 1936 will be a second gallery. They also have plans to build a welcome center with an outdoor aircraft plaza where you can see the active runway of Charlotte Douglas.

Saucier says main focus of this all is education.

“We get to take care of that plane, the artifacts, and be that national center for this Smithsonian level story, but we use that story to invite the next generation of innovators to think about what they want to do,” he said.