Missed by that much, no wait wait!

Incompetent idiots! Sack them all! (from the comfort of my armchair).

A gust of wind at the wrong moment is all it takes.

That will be a very expensive repair. Black Hawk rotor blades don't come cheap, and luckily it held together till they got it into a local park.

I don't think the board of inquiry will agree with your sentiments, Louise. (In fact, I'd be willing to bet a very large sum that they won't.)

While the ultimate responsibility always rests upon the captain of the aircraft (in this case, the pilot), much of the responsibility for maintaining clearance in such situations is on the crewman, (the bloke down the back).

Everyone on board the helo - and quite possibly on the ship as well - should be VERY thankful that he really ***ed up badly and gave that mast a good hard hit rather than just a glancing blow. In hitting it full on, he destroyed the weighted tips of all four rotor blades, thus sort of re-establishing some semblance of balance in the rotor disc. if he'd just barely clipped one blade and removed the tip of one, two or three of the blades, the out of balance would have been horrendous and almost certainly would have made the aircraft uncontrollable.

The old saying that any landing you walk away from is a good one applies, and he did well to get the beast onto the ground in one piece, but I am pretty sure he won't be receiving any congratulations from his peers and superiors- and no one will be extolling his flying skills. Sullenberger Mark 2 he definitely is NOT.