‘Miracle’ air traffic controller to open L.B. Brewing Co.

Trio of local home brewers raises nearly $30,000 on Kickstarter

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In the minutes before Capt. Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger famously landed US Airways Flight 1549 in the Hudson River on Jan. 15, 2009, after bird strikes caused both engines to fail, Long Beach resident Patrick Harten, the air traffic controller who was communicating with Sullenberger, was desperately trying to find a runway close enough for Flight 1549 to land on.

For his efforts in what became known as the Miracle on the Hudson, Harten became something of a celebrity in the air traffic control world. Whether that will help him in his new endeavor — as a craft brewing entrepreneur — remains to be seen.

“It was the first time that I had worked an emergency situation where the outcome was out of my control,” Harten recalled of that dramatic day. (In a Clint Eastwood-directed biopic called “Sully,” set for release in September, Harten will be played by the actor Patch Darragh.) “Usually when we handle emergencies, we get them back to the airport and everything’s fine. This time, no matter what I did, there was no way that I could get him back to the airport no matter what runways I cleared, no matter what air space I cleared.”

Though still directing planes out of La Guardia Airport, Harten, 42, is eligible to retire in less than eight years, and will jump at the opportunity should he succeed in the craft brewery business. He and friends Brett Blau, 50, and Dan Scandiffio, 44, are in the process of turning their garage hobby of creating tasty beer into the Long Beach Brewing Company, after generating nearly $30,000 on Kickstarter.

“It’s always been in the back of our mind to try to make this into a business,” Harten said. “But the more we started brewing together and the product was coming out better and better with each batch, we decided, why not, let’s go for it.”

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