Southwest pilot, former Navy fighter pilot, praised for her 'nerves of steel' during emergency.

Southwest Airlines - On Tuesday April 17th, 2018 less than 30 minutes into its planned trip from New York to Dallas, one of Flight 1380's two engines lost a fan blade and its engine cover, sending shrapnel into the plane's wing, smashing a window, and damaging the fuselage. Passengers say they heard what sounded like explosions. Some of the 144 passengers on board began to send text messages to family members saying their good bye's as oxygen masks deployed in the suddenly depressurized cabin. For a few seconds, the aircraft rolled to an angle of 41 degrees before leveling out and starting an emergency descent, federal investigators said on Wednesday. They rapidly descended from about 30,000 feet to 10,000 feet in five minutes in a controlled descent by the pilots with "Nerves of Steel" - described by passenger Alfred Tumlinson on Wednesday.

Two years after earning her bachelor's degree in biology and agribusiness from MidAmerica Nazarene University in Olathe, Kansas, Captain Tammie Jo Shults' joined the Navy in 1985. She wanted to join the Air Force but they would not allow her the opportunity to be a female pilot. She knew she would have to work harder than everyone else to make her dream to become a pilot a reality and turned to the Navy for that opportunity.

As one of the Navy's first female fighter pilots, she served in VAQ-34, a tactical electronic warfare squadron out of Point Mugu, California, that helped train ship crews to respond to Soviet missile threats, according to Navy records. Shults later was an instructor for the EA-6B Prowler, an electronic warfare plane that counts jamming radar systems and gathering radio intelligence among its responsibilities, and for the F/A-18, a carrier-capable combat jet, the records show. After transferring to the reserves from 1993 to 2001, she retired as a lieutenant commander with two Navy Marine Corps Achievement Medals and a National Defense Service Medal. She was also a pistol marksman, according to records.

Linda Maloney, a retired Navy flight officer who served with Shults, said that her former colleague was always passionate about flying and that her efforts Tuesday showed how Navy training prepared her well.

"We have part of the aircraft missing so we're going to need to slow down a bit."

Robert Sumwalt, chairman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said at a news conference Wednesday that when the engine failed, the plane began a "rapid, uncommanded left roll" as steep as 41 degrees. The typical maximum is only about 20 degrees, he said, so "it would be alarming." He continued, "You could hear their intonation. The pilots seemed very calm and assured about what they're doing. My hat is off to them. They behaved in a manner that their training would prepare them for."

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"Southwest 1380, we're single engine," the pilot radioed to air traffic control. "Could you have medical meet us there on the runway, as well? We've got injured passengers," Shults requested. The air traffic controller then asks her whether her plane is on fire, to which Shults calmly replies: "No, it's not on fire, but part of it's missing. They said there's a hole, and — uh — someone went out." One passenger was partially sucked out with half her torso hanging out of the broken window. Other passengers were able to pull her back inside the aircraft. Passenger Jennifer Riordan, a 43-year-old mother-of-two and executive for Wells Fargo bank in Albuquerque, New Mexico, was confirmed as the woman who they pulled back inside the aircraft. Unfortunately, she died from blunt force trauma to the head and neck.

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The plane went from an altitude of 31,684 feet to about 10,000 feet in a little more than five minutes, according to data from Flightradar24.com. The plane descended precipitously, passenger Kristopher Johnson said, but the pilot "regained control" and informed passengers the flight was headed to Philadelphia.

Once the aircraft landed, Schults personally addressed each passenger as they deplaned. Southwest Airlines said in a statement the company was "devastated" by Tuesday's event, which left passenger Jennifer Riordan, a mother of two, dead. Shults, 56, and Ellisor said they won't be partaking in any interviews, and "ask that the public and the media respect our focus."

Shults said in a joint statement with First Officer Darren Ellisor Wednesday that "as Captain and First Officer of the Crew of five who worked to serve our Customers aboard Flight 1380 yesterday, we all feel we were simply doing our jobs."

• Photo Credit: Diana McBride Self via Facebook.com