Bangalore: The chopper has ‘landed’

Twenty-six hours after it made an emergency landing atop an apartment building, the Schweizer-300C helicopter belonging  to the HAL Rotary Wing Academy was finally brought down to the ground using a truck mounted crane on Friday.

The helicopter, weighing around 500 kg, was brought down from the terrace of the four-storey building in near darkness at 6.55 pm  even as the crane developed snags a couple of times during the process.

The decision to bring down the helicopter was taken after the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) officials from Hyderabad inspected it and decided to dismantle delicate parts of the chopper and bring it down manually.

The tilted chopper, whose rotor blades and the tail touched the parapet wall of the apartment, was first made to stand on the landing skit by the HAL engineers who later emptied the fuel and removed the rotary blades, tyres and side door planes.

A truck was stationed adjacent to the crane to place the helicopter once it was brought down. As the crane moved towards the terrace to lift the helicopter, its hydraulics snapped. The crane operators, after rectifying the snag, made a couple of dry runs before it hooked on to the chopper.

At 6 pm, the crane lifted the helicopter and started bringing it down. The crane was hit by another snag and the chopper remained suspended in the air for about 30 minutes.

The engineers then brought a taller truck so that the chopper-landing skit could be placed on the top of it. Finally, the chopper was grounded at 6.55 pm amid cheers from the HAL employees and the local people, who had gathered in large numbers at the spot.