Stranded Russian jet could be headed indoors

In other obscure news from Michigan. We have captured a Russian military cargo plane. I think it may have been a stolen plane, not actually on official Russian business. Very strange story...




www.uppermichiganssource.com... SQxU

SAWYER -- Some progress to report on the removal of a Russian cargo jet sitting in the middle of Sawyer International Airport.

The Marquette County Board this week approved the use of hanger 663 to house the aircraft for inspection and repairs.

According to Sawyer Airport Manager Keith Kaspari he's contacting headlands limited the owner of the huge military jet. They had originally set March 1 to start working on the plane. Headlands was awarded the aircraft last December in court proceedings in Marquette.

The plane landed at sawyer in July 2009 to refuel for a flight to Pakistan. The five crew members were arrested on immigration violations and the plane was reported stolen and has been at Sawyer ever since.

The five crew members were arrested on immigration violations and the plane was reported stolen and has been at Sawyer ever since.

Arrests for "Immigration violations"?? Wonder what the REAL story behind this is.

Wish we were arresting "violators" like this coming from the South of our borders...

Interesting, but funny enough the article picture is titled "ukjet.jpg" and i would assume the picture has nothing to do with the article from that alone...

It looks like a C-17 Globemaster used by the RAF, i believe it is an american made transport plane/carrier, not sure if the russian's have purchased any, but the UK has, slightly off-topic; i happened to see one fly over south-west england at about 15:40 earlier today which i thought was rather strange, surprised to see something like that, i believe it was heading south-east if anyone is interested. Appeared to be painted very dark (dull green/black). Those things make a hell of a noise.

Originally posted by InsideYourMind
Interesting, but funny enough the article picture is titled "ukjet.jpg" and i would assume the picture has nothing to do with the article from that alone...

It looks like a C-17 Globemaster used by the RAF, i believe it is an american made transport plane/carrier, not sure if the russian's have purchased any, but the UK has, slightly off-topic; i happened to see one fly over south-west england at about 15:40 earlier today which i thought was rather strange, surprised to see something like that, i believe it was heading south-east if anyone is interested. Appeared to be painted very dark (dull green/black). Those things make a hell of a noise.

I don't think it's a c17. Look at where the wings meet the fuselage and compare that to a real c17 picture on google images. The engines look too small and the tail is not the same.

pretty sure its a Russian 11-76 cargo plane

It is an Il-78 - tanker variant of the venerable Il-76 - a fairly old cargo lifter roughly in the same class as the C-141 Starlifter. These are used for heavy cargo flights all around the world due to low purchase/capital costs - en.wikipedia.org...

There are plenty of articles on this a/c around the net - here, and here

I have to agree with the above two posters. It is NOT a C-17 (Note the lack of winglets, the more pronounced anhedral of the wings and the smaller engines)

Plus if it were a C-17, the RAF or USAF would not leave it at a muni field. As noted its an IL-78. With updated avionics no doubt since it was allowed to fly in US airspace.