Watch: Huge military plane lands on tiny runway at wrong airport

wtsp.com

A massive military cargo plane had to make an extremely difficult landing on a tiny runway after coming into the wrong airport in Florida this weekend. Scroll down to see the video

The C-17 cargo plane was bound for the MacDill Air Force Base on the southern tip of Tampa, but accidentally landed at the tiny Peter O. Knight Airport in the middle of a residential area.

Shocked local crowds said they believed the plane would crash through the end of the small runway and end up in Tampa Bay.

Peter O. Knight airport is around four miles north of MacDill, and a lot smaller, with the runway being 3,500ft long compared with MacDill's 11,500ft tarmac.

Another pilot who witnessed the landing, Don Sipila, told wtsp.com: "Two words: one starts with O and one starts with S.

"It was extremely loud, the wings were wavering a little bit because he was doing a curving type of thing. You could clearly see this was a maximum effort short field landing. You don't practice these things.

"We all thought he was going to go off the end. Clearly this was the wrong airport for this aircraft."

Silipa explained he believed the enormous cargo plane got clearance to land at MacDill, saying: "MacDill is about five miles right off the end of this runway and it has the same number: 22 lined up in the same direction. But it's 11,500 feet long ... as a pilot I could see it's a long runway. This is only 3,500 feet!"

After several hours of burning off fuel to lighten its load, the C-17 returned to the sky the cheers of hundreds of residents who had gathered to watch its take-off.

The Air Force has not released details on what caused the mix-up, and airport officials revealed there was no damage to the tiny runway.

See the footage here:



See some of the scariest airports for take-offs and landings below:

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