Southwest Airlines pilot lauded as a ‘trailblazer’ for women

“Injured passengers, okay, and is your airplane physically on fire?” asks a male voice in the tower, according to a recording released by officials. After she was returned to the cabin, a nurse who happened to be on board attempted CPR.

During the harrowing ordeal on the NY to Dallas flight, Shults, a former Navy pilot, kept a cool head, maneuvering the jet with just one engine and landing it safely in Philadelphia.

Despite the crisis on board, Schults was calm as she told Air Traffic Control: ‘So we have a part of the aircraft missing’.

Women aviators were excluded from combat missions until the month after Shults got off active duty in March 1993, but Flanders said Shults flew during Operation Desert Storm trainings as an aggressor enemy pilot. She is also being hailed for her pioneering role in a career where she has been one of the few women at the controls.

After Flight 1380’s emergency landing, Shults walked down the aisle and checked in on passengers, travelers said.

Hess said she listened to the audio exchange between Shults and Philadelphia airport air traffic controllers and was impressed.

“No, it’s not on fire”, Shults said.

McCullough says Tammie Jo Shults’ heroic landing is unlikely to change the number of women pilots.

Investigators say a fan blade snapped off as Southwest Flight 1380 cruised at 500 miles per hour high above Pennsylvania. “Southwest 1380, don’t worry, we’ll work it out”.

“We just got lucky, we had the right pilot for that event”, said Coleman.

“Emergency landing! Southwest flight from NYC to Dallas!”

There are some in Beeville who still remember the pilot.

Eventually, she became the first woman to fly the Navy’s newest fighter jet at the time, the F/A-18 Hornet, under the condition that she did so as a co-pilot.

“The nature of her talk was sharing her life journey and life path, and encouraging female students to pursue their dreams and don’t give up. “Thankfully, no. The fact that they’re putting two and two together – ‘Hey, my mom does this” – you know, makes me feel proud of what I did in the past that they haven’t gotten to see”. “I did not say another word”. I’m just telling you they were just applauding.

The New Mexico native graduated with university degrees in biology and agribusiness before joining the military.

But the challenges continued. “She’s a very caring, giving person who takes care of lots of people”, he added.

“She even created a business that does girl pilot stuff to empower other women to be able to be feminine and be who they are in the workplace”, Thompson said. She was awesome. The lady, the crew, everything, everybody was immaculate. “She said she wasn’t going to let anyone tell her she couldn’t”, former classmate Cindy Foster told The Kansas City Star.

She served in the Navy for 10 years, reaching the rank of Navy lieutenant commander, before meeting her husband, who was also a Navy pilot at the time. She has led the children’s worship program at First Baptist and taught Sunday School for children, middle schoolers, high schoolers and adults, said Staci Thompson, a longtime friend and administrative assistant in the church office.

-Ben Kesling contributed to this article.