Flight operations at the Goa Airport (commonly known as Dabolim) were briefly disrupted on Saturday afternoon after a fire erupted when an external fuel tank from a MiG-29K fighter aircraft of the Indian Navy detached while it was taking off.
Flash. #GoaAirport closed temporarily for a few hours view incident of fire caused by a drop tank of MiG 29K which got detached whilst taking off. All efforts in hand to resume flights ASAP. MiG 29K fighter ac is safe. @aaigoaairport @AAI_Official pic.twitter.com/5iDRT8r6BX
— SpokespersonNavy (@indiannavy) June 8, 2019
The Dabolim Airport is operated by the Indian Navy. The Indian Navy's official Twitter handle informed “Goa Airport closed temporarily for a few hours view incident of fire caused by a drop tank of MiG-29K which got detached whilst taking off...”. The Indian Navy added the MiG-29K was safe.
The official Twitter handle of the Goa Airport informed the fuel tank landed on the runway and that operations were suspended for two hours. At 3pm, the Indian Navy tweeted flight operations had resumed.
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The MiG-29K, designed and built in Russia, was inducted into the Indian Navy in 2009. The supersonic fighter carries external fuel tanks to improve its range and endurance. While these tanks can be jettisoned in flight, this is rarely done over populated areas. In January last year, a trainer variant of the MiG-29K crashed after it aborted takeoff at Dabolim.
The Indian Navy purchased a total of 45 MiG-29Ks from Russia, primarily for the purpose of operating them off the aircraft carrier INS Vikramaditya and under-construction Indigenous Aircraft Carrier. The MiG-29K had been plagued with complaints of poor serviceability in its early years of service.
