(UTV|COLOMBO) – A Myanmar pilot safely landed a jet without front wheels after the landing gear failed to deploy.
The Myanmar National Airlines plane skidded down the runway at Mandalay airport before grinding to a stop.
The pilot of the Embraer 190 was praised for the landing, in which none of the 89 passengers was hurt.
Captain Myat Moe Aung circled the airport twice to allow air traffic controllers to determine if the landing gear was down, the airline said.
The aircraft had departed from Yangon and was approaching Mandalay when the pilot was unable to extend the front landing gear. He followed emergency procedures and burned excess fuel to reduce the aircraft’s weight, the airline said.
A video of the landing showed the plane landing on its rear wheels before the nose touched down on the runway. The plane skidded for about 25 seconds before it stopped.
“The pilot did a great job,” Win Khant, Myanmar’s transport minister, told the Reuters news agency.
The incident was the second aviation accident in Myanmar this week. On Wednesday, a Biman Bangladesh Airlines plane skidded off the runway when it landed in bad weather at Yangon’s international airport, injuring at least 17 people.
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