Sparks fly as World Cup journalists' plane belly-flops

Brilliant piloting skills once again - this could have been a total World Cup disaster. Interestingly enough, John Travolta's jet is parked at this airport at the moment.

JOHANNESBURG — A plane carrying journalists to a World Cup match made an emergency landing near Johannesburg Sunday, sending sparks flying as its belly flopped along the tarmac, an airport spokesman said.

All those on board the flight escaped unhurt, including a group working for the Qatar-based Al-Jazeera network who were on their way to cover Algeria's match against Slovenia.

Mike Christoph, operations manager at Lanseria airport, located to the northwest of Johannesburg, said that the pilot had had to bring down his plane after experiencing problems with its undercarriage.

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One of my ex-girlfriends works there - she confirmed on gmail chat:

undercarriage problem, did a belly flop landing

John Travolta was still able to fly out earlier, but apparently his jet caused a lot of problems for other commercial flights as he was made a priority:

The airport also confirmed the runway was cleared in time for film star John Travolta to fly from Lanseria to Durban in his own Qantas-branded 707 aircraft.

Travolta is a spokesman for the Australian airline and is in South Africa to support the Australian football team at the World Cup.

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Well I'm glad John Travolta was ok . .

reply to post by alaskan




John Travolta is Mr Cool. I bet e could have landed that plane even if it had lost the wings.