The pilot of a small jet was forced by mechanical problems at his aircraft to join the traffic of the I-70 on Sunday. Imagine the surprise the drivers experienced.

"Dispatch called on the radio and said we had a plane landing on I-70, not something that happens everyday," Scott Chapman with the Hancock County Sheriff's department said.

The pilot had to make an emergency landing and used the I-70 as an airport runway Sunday afternoon. Hancock County Deputies closed the highway over that stretch so the pilot could get his plane back in the air.

The small plane had just taken off from Eagle Creek Airport and the pilot had engine trouble at about 7,000 feet in the air. The controllers told pilot Babar Suleman to look for an airport, but the only reasonable option he had was to land on the Interstate-70. It wasn’t the destination he had hoped for, but it had to do.

"There was more traffic going west and there was less traffic going east. So I opted for the east side," Suleman told WISH-TV.

Suleman saw a break in traffic and flew his plane 50-75 feet above the highway until he saw an overpass on the horizon. He saw two trucks and two cars behind them and he decided to land the plane in between the two cars. He said the drivers seemed to have cooperated with him.

The Hancock County Sheriff's Department found a way to get the plane back in the air and get traffic moving again, after closing that section of the motorway. The FAA allowed the pilot to make some “fuel mixture adjustments” in the plane and, after some tests, Suleman managed to take off.

Deputies blocked the highway for two miles, just enough for the pilot to take off.
Suleman flew back to Eagle Creek Airport where he will meticulously check the aircraft.

Deputy Scott Chapman made use of his sense of humor and said that the plane had stopped next to a no-parking sign and police had put an "abandoned" sticker on the plane. According to the Federal Aviation Administration database, the small engine airplane is a 1977 Piper PA-32R-300 owned by Indy Lance LLC.