Passengers who were on the United Express plane that made an emergency landing at Newark Airport last night were full of love for the flight crew, calling them "amazing" and "professional." But it was nerve-wracking: One passenger said, "We were saying our prayers because we just thought it was the end. I sent a text to my sons letting them know that I love them, and I hope everything works out."

The commuter plane, a Embraer 170 flying from Atlanta to Newark, held 71 people. The pilot notified Newark air traffic control about the issue and, when he was given clearance to land, tilted the plane's nose up. One passenger said, "I knew it was going to be a bumpy landing, but it was way smoother than I thought.” Here's how the passenger who texted his sons, Steve Parowski, described it:

Airline consultant and former pilot Bob Herbst told the Star-Ledger that "landing an airliner without the front landing gear is similar in key respects to a normal landing and occurs several times a year around the country without fatal results."

"You typically land on those two back wheels," Herbst said of the similarity between normal landings and last night’s. "Of all of the emergencies that we would deal with, that’s probably the choice that would be the easiest to deal with."

In this type of case, he said, after the rear wheels touch down, the pilot holds back the yoke, or steering wheel, to keep the nose up as long as possible.

Once the plane slows to about 60 to 70 miles per hour, the nose will tilt down on its own, and the plane will skid to a halt in a couple of hundred yards.

"The nose gear really is not that big of a deal," Herbst said. "You just hold it off as long as possible and when the aircraft is going slow enough, the nose will come down and rest on the pavement."

Passenger Shellie Bill said, "When we were skidding on the runway, you could smell the metal. That’s when I thought, ‘Oh, this is real, when are we going to stop?’ You know, how long is it going to take, because without wheels, what happens?” She added, "After a minute or two, they said everyone evacuate, the doors were opened, and calmly, nobody was pushing or shoving or anything, everyone just went down the slides... For a crash landing it was pretty decent."