A Myanmar pilots expertise saved the day after his aircraft’s landing gear failed, safely putting the jet on the runway with no front wheels on Sunday, an official said.
Myanmar Airlines flight UB-103 – an Embraer-190 model – touched the ground at around 9am in Mandalay, a city popular among foreign tourists. The plane carried 82 passengers and a crew of seven.
Ye Htut Aung, deputy director general of Myanmar’s Civil Aviation Department, told AFP the pilot tried repeatedly to deploy the front landing gear – first through its computer system, then manually.
The nail-biting touchdown – in which no one was hurt – was the second instance of a malfunctioning flight in less than a week within the country.
Sunday’s incident came just four days after a Biman Bangladesh Airlines plane skidded off a runway while landing at Yangon airport in a storm, injuring 17 passengers. police said, a freak storm hit the city as the plan was landing. Myanmar’s monsoon season has caused problems for commercial and military flights in the past.
For its part, Embraer said in a statement that it was “offering its full cooperation to the aviation authorities in order to aid in the investigation”.
