UPDATE: Marc Mortenson, Assistant to the City Manager of St. George, issued a clarifying statement this evening that the plane involved in this incident is a vintage 1957 Lockheed T 33 painted to look like an original Blue Angel jet.
ST. GEORGE – A privately owned aircraft suffered a landing gear malfunction in flight this afternoon on approach to St. George Municipal Airport, requiring an emergency landing.
“The pilot got one gear down but could not get the other one down,” said Brad Kitchen, Airport Operations Supervisor and Aircraft Rescue Firefighter for the Airport.
In coordination with Kitchen and Airport Fire Rescue, the pilot retracted the gears and prepared for an emergency landing. “We foamed the runway, the plane was landed without incident, and they came out,” said Kitchen. The plane was then also foamed as a fire prevention measure.
The plane, an Air Canada CT-133 according to Kitchen, carried two people, pilot and co-pilot, both local to St. George area and neither were harmed in the incident. There names are not being released at this time.
St. George Fire Department was also on scene as a back-up, although the only service required of it was the refilling of water for the Airport’s firefighters.
