Extremely happy that he made it down in one piece, great landing and looking back at it - it's impossible to critique as he made it down without killing or hurting anyone. Looked as though there were a few fields he could have chosen from. By landing on that highway, he put even more lives in danger and was most likely thinking about saving the plane. It worked this time, and hopefully won't need to be tested again.
I hope I never have to put my money where my mouth is, but I hope I do the right thing and put myself before the plane, if I ever need to make that decision.
myself and a friend were flying a 172.....well.....TRYING to fly it. N738RE. suffered a partial engine failure taking off. serious misfire at around 300 to 400 ft alt. got her to smooth out, and continued our climb to pattern alt, as i made the call that we were having trouble. 2 aircraft on downwind actually exited the pattern to the north, which i thought(afterwards) was unnecessary.
we got her back on the runway, taxied up to the maintenance hangar, and shut her down.
then we got yelled at for saving that airplane. the cfi that was yelling at us told us we should've declared an emergency, and landed in the field off the end of the runway. he said that as soon as that plane developed that problem, it belonged to the insurance company.
we were thanked by the club owner. i still think we did the right thing. that kid did the right thing too. if you notice when the kid with the camera points it back, there is only 1 car there. probably a very lightly traveled road to begin with.
