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Myanmar pilot safely lands plane on its nose

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YANGON: An experienced pilot was praised as a hero in Myanmar on Sunday after he managed to land a passenger plane without any front landing gear, and without causing any injuries to those on board. The Myanmar National Airlines flight from Yangon to Mandalay landed on Sunday morning without its front wheels extended, the airline said. The Embraer plane was reportedly carrying 82 passengers and seven crew members. Videos captured by witnesses showed the aircraft touch down on its back wheels before the nose fell onto the runway. Smoke billowed as the nose scraped against the concrete before finally coming to a stop.


Photographs taken afterwards showed the plane with its escape chutes deployed, but with little other major damage. Captain Myat Moe Aung, who was also an instructor, flew past air traffic controllers twice so they could check whether the landing gear was down, the airline said. When he confirmed that it was not, “the captain followed emergency procedures and did the fuel burn out to reduce the landing weight,” the statement said. He has been hailed as a hero on social media, and photos showed him shaking hands with Mandalay region chief minister Zaw Myint Maung on the runway.


Myanmar’s Ministry of Transport and Communications said that it would investigate the mechanical failure. Without a nose wheel, a plane has to land on its rear wheels and use its underside — or belly — for support in the front. Such landings come with grave risks as the plane hits the ground at speed, but are not uncommon, either due to human error — often the pilot forgetting to extend the landing gear — or mechanical failure. This was the second aviation incident in Myanmar in less than a week. On Wednesday, 20 people were injured when a Biman Bangladesh Airlines plane skidded off the runway and broke into several pieces during a storm in Yangon. — DPA


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