Chesley Sullenberger: Boeing 737 Max pilot training not 'sufficient'

June 19 (UPI) -- Famed "Miracle on the Hudson" pilot Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger and other pilots criticized Boeing for failing to properly train pilots on 737 Max jets during a congressional hearing Wednesday.

The retired US Airways pilot, who safely crash landed an Airbus jet on the Hudson River in 2009, said pilots of the aircraft should've been fully trained on flight simulators before practicing with the new aircraft full of passengers.

"Reading about it on an iPad is not even close to sufficient," he said during a House Subcommittee on Aviation hearing.

Additionally, he said that after using flight simulators to test the Boeing 737 Max aircraft, he believes it's unlikely other pilots using the simulator would've experienced the scenario that caused the crash of two planes in Indonesia and Ethiopia over the past year.

A Lion Air Crash in October left 189 people dead and an Ethiopian Airlines crash in March killed 157.

Investigators said they found key evidence that strongly suggests a link between the two crashes. They found a device called a jackscrew, which controls the angle of the plane's horizontal stabilizers. The stabilizers were found in the upward position, which would have forced the nose of the plane down.

The Boeing 737 Max 8 and 9 aircraft have been grounded worldwide as Boeing works on a software fix to correct the error linked to the crashes.

Sullenberger warned that if U.S. officials don't address ways in which the "current system of aircraft design and certification has failed us," crashes like those in Indonesia and Ethiopia could happen in the United States.

"I'm one of the relatively small group of people who have experienced such a sudden crisis -- and I lived to share what we learned about it," he said. "I can tell you firsthand that the startle factor is real and it is huge -- it interferes with one's ability to quickly analyze the crisis and take effective action.

"Within seconds these crews would have been fighting for their lives in the fight of their lives."

Cpt. Daniel Carey, president of the Allied Pilots Association, also testified, blaming Boeing for not notifying Max pilots about the existence of the planes' maneuvering characteristics augmentation system.

"They didn't ever tell us the system existed," he testified. "Therefore robust training was not conducted."