You may have felt the Earth shake a little in Kelowna yesterday. If you had looked up, you probably saw a massive metal aircraft buzzing low over the city.
That plane was a Royal Canadian Air Force CC-177 Globemaster III transport plane. It made a couple of low passes over the city yesterday as part of military training.
“It was crazy close, it freaked me out,” Jackie Zychowka told KelownaNow.
Yvette Moore said she saw the plane flying low circles over the city, and that her whole neighbourhood was out on the streets watching the spectacle.
According to the RCAF, the Globemaster III is used to transport troops, cargo and oversized combat equipment across the country and around the world.
The 53-metre aircraft has an almost 52-metre wingspan, and weighs 125,645 kilograms when empty. It can carry 72,727 kilograms of cargo, and travel as fast as Mach 0.77.
The RCAF uses it for “a wide range of strategic and tactical missions.” It only requires three crew: a pilot, co-pilot and loadmaster.
Pilots can fly the CC-177 wearing night-vision goggles, and the plane can take off and land on unpaved runways as short as 1,067 metres and as narrow as 27.4 metres.
Click here for more information on the CC-177 Globemaster III.
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