![Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger captain of the US Airways flight #5149 that landed in New York's Hudson River in 2009, poses in his office at his home in Danville, Calif on Jan. 10. 2011.](https://api.time.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/sully-sullenberger.jpg?quality=85&w=2400)
In 2011 it was J. Edgar Hoover; in 2014, ‘American Sniper’ Chris Kyle. Now, director Clint Eastwood seems to have found his next all-American protagonist: Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger, the pilot who safely landed an Airbus A320 in New York City’s Hudson River in 2009.
Eastwood is set to direct the as-yet-unnamed biopic on the now-retired airline pilot, lauded as a national hero after the so-called “Miracle on the Hudson,” when he was forced to land US Airways Flight 1549 on water after a flock of Canadian geese disabled both of his engines following its takeoff from LaGuardia Airport.
The film is based on the New York Times bestselling memoir Sullenberger co-authored with Wall Street Journal columnist Jeffrey Zaslow: Highest Duty: My Search for What Really Matters.
If the film does nearly as well as Eastwood’s American Sniper, which grossed upwards of $543 million worldwide in 2014, it’ll be a smooth landing indeed.
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