RIAT 2002 G222 Display
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I'd never even heard
of a G222 before coming to RIAT 2002. However this Italian
designed cargo plane put on the most memorable display I've ever seen by
a cargo plane, and the most memorable landing I've ever seen by any plane!
The display even started with a bang, with the pilot flying at low level
along the runway for several hundred meters immediately after takeoff.
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OK, they had to
get the boring stuff over, so they did a slow flypast with the wheels and
flaps down, and the rear cargo ramp open.
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Here's another entirely
gratuitous shot for the hard-core aircraft fanatics which adds absolutely
nothing to the previous shot! Those must be about the ugliest
sets of landing gear I've ever seen, except maybe for the ones on an Antonov
AN-124. These ones look like fat rubber tires on the end of
a stick!
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He's just doing
a slow pass, but listening to the wildly exuberant commentary by the Italian
announcer, you'd think that the guy was doing a loop!
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Oh my... |
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GOD! |
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Now that was something
I've never seen a cargo plane do! And for his last trick, he's
going to bank around for a landing...
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...But not just
any old landing. This is called a "Sarajevo" landing, after
the city in Bosnia. To avoid ground fire, planes landing at
Sarajevo came in at fairly high altitude, diving down at the last moment.
As you can see, it's a pretty intense way to land a plane, and in this
particular case it lead to an accident.
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