Stricken plane that came off the runway is lifted from slope

ISTANBUL - Turkish engineers used two cranes to successfully lift a passenger plane that skidded onto a muddy embankment meters from the sea back onto the runway.

The Pegasus Airlines Boeing 737-800 plane had landed normally at Trabzon airport late on Jan 14 on a flight from Ankara but then went off the runway just meters from the waters of the Black Sea with its wheels stuck in mud.

Since then, it has remained on the steep slope that descends from the airport apron into the sea for four days, its nose pointing down and managing to defy gravity by being stuck in thick mud.