To say the least, it takes incredible finesse to land a 7-ton fighter jet on a stool.
U.S. Marine Corps Capt. William Mahoney did just that while flying a AV-8B Harrier aircraft. June 7th was supposed to be a “normal flight day,” but it soon went awry. Earlier in the flight, Mahoney realized his plane had a front landing gear malfunction.
Mahoney slowed his plane and reached out to the control deck. He approached the aircraft carrier at about 300 feet to allow operators to access the problem. It was clear that his front landing gear was inoperable.
“At this point, it was time to figure out how to get the jet back safely with only 3 landing gear,” explained Mahoney.
Luckily, there was a solution. The Marine Corps has a specific tool to allow the nose of the plane to land on when this sort of problem arises. The tool is essentially a large stool for the nose to land on. A lighting service on the jet allows it to land at a pinpointed spot. The difficult task for Mahoney would be to land exactly vertically on the stool.
Trying to complete the task at hand, Mahoney remarked he had “forgotten (he) didn’t have nose gear.”
“I was just focused on landing, I decided that’s what I had to do,” he said.
And he did just that. Mahoney landed with incredible finesse, even though he couldn’t even see the stool from the cockpit. As seen on the video footage, the nose bounced up once before settling on the stool.
“I didn’t realize how much I was shaking until I got out of the aircraft,” he said.
With the successful landing, the flight crew on deck rushed to Mahoney, both checking in on him while also congratulating him too.
While Mahoney admits that Marine pilots “pride” themselves on being able to land in any condition, he also noted “there’s no way to train to land in this type of situation.”
(h/t IJ Review)
