SAA 742 ZS-SAN final landing on Rand's 1493m long RWY

SkyJet · Post by **SkyJet** » 09 Nov 2004, 21:11

South African Airways donated one of its first 747-244B ZS-SAN "Lebombo" to the Johannesburg-Rand based SAA-museum.

The aircraft touched down on the 1493m long and 15m wide runway at the "hot and high" airport at an elevation of 5568ft (1700m).
Knowing that the main gear measures about 13m width, it's needless to say little room for error was left at landing!
The high-experienced and high-skilled crew landed the aircraft on the centreline at its final landing...
Very nice job!

Avro · Post by **Avro** » 09 Nov 2004, 21:40

Those are some very nice pictures and some very good pilots as well !!!!

Thanks for sharing

Chris

Vonsmalhausen · Post by **Vonsmalhausen** » 09 Nov 2004, 21:44

nice job

AN124 · Post by **AN124** » 09 Nov 2004, 22:20

Very nice shots and as Chris already mentions those are some damn good pilots.

I'm wondering if they already landed the jumbo on the first approach or that they first made a overshoot to get a "feeling" with the runway.

Best Regards,
Yvo

website-info · Post by **website-info** » 10 Nov 2004, 09:32

Guys,

These guys are the BEST, the are the ones who do the flying displays with the B744 at Duxford each year and Farnborough this year. As for practice, they made several approachs to Rand in the weeks running up to the big day, but no touch and go.

The aircraft is now on display at Rand for all to see and visit, and in the future will be there with several other ex SAA historic aircraft,

Rgds
Tony

moons · Post by **moons** » 10 Nov 2004, 10:20

These old guys know to fly

Fantastic! I thought this was only possible in FS

greets

Rago · Post by **Rago** » 10 Nov 2004, 22:02

AN124 wrote:Very nice shots and as Chris already mentions those are some damn good pilots.

I'm wondering if they already landed the jumbo on the first approach or that they first made a overshoot to get a "feeling" with the runway.

Best Regards,
Yvo

They had to make two go-arounds because of bad weather. Was on the spot when they landed the SAN, and they only used half the runway to come to a complete stop.... 8O
If the landing wasn't succesfull that day, they were going to scrap the baby...

Post by **Bruspotter** » 27 Nov 2004, 21:48

Hello everyody!

VERY NICE!!!! Thats indeed a very small airport for a 747. Must been a
real kick to land there , good that it was landing , .... if would have
tried to depart on a 1400m runway..........auch.......!!!!

A special day for all 'Rand-spotters'.

Best Regards: Yannick

Post by **Kapitein** » 28 Nov 2004, 00:28

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/708105/L/

This is how it looks on the inside

bigjulie · Post by **bigjulie** » 03 Dec 2004, 00:23

Those 2 pilots are very good pilots, I would be happy if I was a pax on 1 of their planes

Falcon_900 · Post by **Falcon_900** » 03 Dec 2004, 09:49

Hello!!

Today I have two heroes. These guys are... Amazing, they only had 2 meter more of runway.

And I thought that I was good when I landed on Casa Rubios (a small aerodrome between two little hills) with the seneca...

Oh my god!

Thank you for the information!

Advisor · Post by **Advisor** » 03 Dec 2004, 10:47

Nostalgic. For when the great scorer comes, to write against your name. He writes not that you won or lost, but how you played the game.

Nice pictures and lovely information. God bless those pilots. They bring back some very good nostalgic moments.