Thursday, September 22 2005 18:44 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: 'Touch the sky with glory' may be IAF's motto, but a brave pilot touched down on earth safely with a crippled aircraft, risking his own life to save countless others.

That is what the young Squadron Leader Jasbir Singh did recently. A flight instructor at the Fighter Training School at Hakimpet IAF academy, near Secunderabad, landed his aircraft, crippled with a flamed out engine, at the school's airfield, adjacent to a heavily populated area in the twin city.

Flying a Kiran Mark IA single-engine trainer, Singh was coming into land at the airfield when it was hit by a fully-grown eagle, which flamed out his single engine.

As the fighter pilot, who has the distinction of having flown Mirages and Sukhoi-30 frontline fighters of the IAF, asked the ground control for assistance he was told to eject immediately as he was flying at an altitude of less that 2,500 feet, where bailing out is mandatory in case of emergency.

"As I looked down. I knew that if I did not control the aircraft it could plunge into the heavily populated cantonement area of Secunderabad. So, I chose to ignore the eject instructions to manoeuvre the crippled fighter somehow to glide down to the runway," the Squadron leader said, recounting here his ordeal of August 25.

Though landing a powerful aircraft like the Kiran without engine working was almost impossible, Singh's courage and experience stood him in good stead and in the end he managed to glide down the aircraft from the reverse side of the runway.

And on top of it, the aircraft landed without a scratch. It has now been refitted with a new engine and is airworthy again.