WATCH: Plane makes emergency landing on busy highway
- By Web Desk -
- Dec 05, 2020
An award-winning aerobatic pilot on Wednesday night made an emergency landing on a busy highway, hitting one car but injuring no one in Minnesota, US.
According to the details, the single-engine plane made a crash-landing after developing an engine fault on 35W highway in Arden Hills, Minnesota.
It is pertinent to mention here that the single-engine plane hit only one vehicle once it landed on the busy highway in St. Paul suburb of Arden Hills. The authorities said that no injuries were reported in the incident.
In a Facebook post, the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT) shared the footage of the moment when Craig Gifford, 52, ‘miraculously’ landed the plane on 35W.
“While this is not quite what we mean by a “multimodal transportation system,” we’re glad no one was injured and are impressed by the pilot’s effort to zipper merge from above,’ the MnDOT said.
Experimental Aircraft Association spokesman Dick Knapinski said Gifford represented the United States in international competition in 2017 and 2019 on the Unlimited Aerobatic Team, which took home the bronze medal at the world championships in South Africa in 2017, Mail Online reported.
Knapinski said pilots take aerobatic training lessons to learn how to better maneuver aircraft in emergency situations, which he said explains how Gifford´s skills helped him pull off the ‘textbook emergency landing’ on the interstate Wednesday night.
Gifford declined to comment, citing the ongoing investigation into the incident by the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation and Safety Board.