Pilot talks ‘extremely rare situation’ after Delta flight lands without nose gear
Photos provided by passengers show the plane on the runway without its front landing gear.
CHARLOTTE, N.C. (WBTV) – The Delta flight that landed at Charlotte Douglas International Airport without its nose gear down is an “extremely rare situation,” according to a commercial airline pilot.
Byron Macrae, who lives in Concord, spoke about Wednesday morning’s emergency landing at the airport. No injuries were reported.
Related: Plane lands at Charlotte-Douglas International Airport without nose gear
Photos provided by passengers show the plane on the runway without its front landing gear.
Macrae said the nose of the plane being right on the center of the runway line is a testament to the pilots’ actions in landing it safely.
“This is textbook. I mean it couldn’t have gone any better,” he said. “Everyone got off. It shows that these pilots were very well qualified. They were very well trained and reverted back to their training.”
Macrae said there are multiple backups and redundancies on aircraft to force the landing gear down in the event it malfunctions.
He noted he’s not familiar with the Boeing 717 aircraft and couldn’t say what the procedures are to try and get the landing gear down.
“This isn’t very common. This isn’t very common at all,” Macrae said.
He added that an investigation will determine what caused the landing gear malfunction.
According to information from Delta Airlines, Flight 1092 departed from Atlanta at 7:25 a.m. Wednesday and landed in Charlotte at 8:58 a.m.
There were two pilots, three flight attendants and 96 customers on board, according to Delta.
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