In a historic first, Indian Air Force’s C-130 J aircraft recently carried out a night landing at the Kargil airstrip. Sharing the video of the landing, the Indian Air Force said that the night landing was carried out by employing terrain masking enroute and termed the exercise a training mission for its Garud commandos.
“An IAF C-130 J aircraft recently carried out a night landing at the Kargil airstrip. Employing terrain masking enroute, the exercise also dovetailed a training mission of the Garuds,” the IAF said in a post on ‘X’.
Situated at an altitude exceeding 8,800 feet, the Kargil airstrip presents a major challenge for pilots to land at night.
Watch the video below:
In a first, an IAF C-130 J aircraft recently carried out a night landing at the Kargil airstrip. Employing terrain masking enroute, the exercise also dovetailed a training mission of the Garuds.#SakshamSashaktAtmanirbhar pic.twitter.com/MNwLzaQDz7
— Indian Air Force (@IAF_MCC) January 7, 2024
By achieving the feat, the IAF has shown its preparedness to carry out night missions in case of any eventuality.
In November last year, the IAF had displayed its operational daredevilry after it landed two of its Lockheed Martin C-130J-30 ‘Super Hercules’ military transport aircraft at an unfeasible air strip in Uttarakhand.
The mission was part of a larger rescue operation to save workers trapped in the collapsed Uttarakhand tunnel. The aircraft had delivered heavy engineering material to aid the rescue teams.
The IAF had said that the landings were carried out in ‘reduced visibility conditions’, to transport 27.5 tonnes of machinery needed to extricate 41 construction workers, who were trapped in the Uttarkashi tunnel.