Newly acquired air force C-130 lands in Cebu  

 

One of the two C-130T Hercules aircraft acquired by the Philippines from the US arrived Tuesday night at the Benito Ebuen Air Base in Mactan, Cebu.

 

The aircraft with tail number 5011 touched down at around 11:25 pm after an almost four-day  trans-Pacific flight, the Philipine Air Force said in a statement posted on its Facebook page.

 

The aircraft took off from Tucson, Arizona last Saturday, April 2 and made stopovers in California, Hawaii, Wake Island and Guam before reaching the Philippines. An all-Filipino crew under the command of Col. Alejandro Baclayon, deputy wing commander of the 220th Airlift Wing, flew the aircraft.

 

 

The C-130T was taken from the US Marine Reserve's active fleet of aircraft was reconfigured from a tanker into a heavy lift transport aircraft.

 

The aircraft will be formally turned over to the Philippine government through Defense Secretary Voltaire Gazmin on April 12 at the Villamor Air Base in Pasay City. — APG, GMA News