B.R. Ambedkar Junior College ground in Nelamangala on Friday afternoon had an unexpected visitor – an Mi-8 helicopter of the Indian Air Force (IAF).
Around 2.45 p.m., residents of the small town of Nelamangala were shaken by the cacophony created by the aircraft and dust flying from the ground. “We were in the midst of our daily kho-kho practice when we saw a helicopter hovering above the ground. Suddenly, it landed on the mud. We fled for our lives,” recalled Sagar Bavadekar, a teenager, outside the ground on Junior College Road. The Russian-made chopper had made an emergency landed due to a technical snag.
Soon after the pilot switched off the engines, a curious crowd gathered to get a closer look at the flying machine.
G. Anil, a local resident, says, “There were five men in uniform, including the pilot. They were conversing in Hindi and discussing about some oil valve problem.”
Soon it was selfie time. Locals started clicking and video-graphing the rarest moment for their tiny town. A police party rushed in to control the swelling crowd.Later, another chopper brought seven IAF technicians to attend to the snag. All the while, the crowd kept growing bigger.
Around 4.40 p.m., the chopper’s blades started rotating blowing dust all over the ground and on curious onlookers.
Within minutes, it was back in the air followed by the backup chopper. As the two vanished into the sky, the crowd got engrossed in discussions on the one-off moment in town.
An IAF spokesperson said that the Mi-8 was involved in routine training. “It was a case of precautionary landing due to a technical problem, which was rectified soon. The helicopter returned to base and IAF personnel on board are safe,” the spokesperson added.
