the gear has 28 sepreate operations to raise or lower it ... alot of the time they land with a bogey up .. pretty scary sight to see mosty the center one is the prob.
i was told a story about how they came to be.. dont know how true it was.. but it was interesting nonetheless, they say the Air Force wanted a heavy lifter , but didnt like the 747's due to cargo loading restrictions, so Lockheed Martin developed it and the Air Force didnt like it due to the maintenance nightmares so they said they didnt want them, and lockheed says, "well you dont buy so many of these, you dont get no more 130's" and they actually halted production on the C-130's untill they bought like 20 some C-5's. pretty sleazy business practice.. but as i said.. dont know how true it is.. but interesting .