Four MiG-31 fighter jets of Russian Aerospace Forces was forced to make an emergency landing in Usinsk, in the Komi Republic.
According to komiinform.ru, in Usinsk, On 16 November, four two-seat supersonic MiG-31 advanced long-range interceptor aircraft made an emergency landing on the alternate airfield.
The cause of the emergency landing is unknown at this point, but local source reported that officials of the Russian Aerospace Forces appealed to JSC Komiaviatrans with a request for refueling of fighter jets.
The general director of the company, Alexander Ponomarev, told the media that this issue is now being resolved.
Aircraft are now at the airport. As soon as the weather conditions permit, the fighters will return to their combat missions.
The MiG-31 is a supersonic interceptor aircraft developed by the Mikoyan design bureau as a replacement for the earlier MiG-25 “Foxbat”; the MiG-31 is based on and shares design elements with the MiG-25. About 500 MiG-31s were produced until the early 1990s, of which 349 were the basic version.
The MiG-31 can climb at a rate of 208m a second and has the capacity to fly at 3,000km/h. The ferry and combat ranges of the aircraft are 3,300km and 720km respectively. The maximum take-off weight of the aircraft is 46,200kg. The cruise range and wing loading capacities are 1,620m and 665kg/m² respectively, while the maximum g-load is 5g.