Virgin Atlantic 747 Lands Safely with Partial Gear

[ShiftyNJ]

A Virgin Atlantic Boeing 747 bound from London-Gatwick to Las Vegas landed safely again at the British airport after it was discovered part of the landing gear was stuck in a half-retracted position.

The Barbarella, carrying 447 passengers and a crew of 15, was a short way into Flight VS0043 when the crew discovered the right wing gear truck was lodged in a partway-open position and would neither extend nor fully retract into the plane. In the photo below it appears there is something wedged between the tires and the inboard door, possibly part of the door itself.



After circling and dumping fuel, the jet landed safely again at Gatwick without incident.

[ck86]

I saw that earlier! That's a relief. Especially giving that my man works for the airline....thankfully not on that plane!

[ShiftyNJ]

here's a much better video of the landing. You can see how hard she came down, bounced into the air again before settling in. But the captain stopped her right on the centerline of the runway.