I find it bizarre that airport fire rescue equipment should be rolled and standing by at SFO for an incident that occurred in ABQ. You're right about no violation, however 14 CFR 91.13 prohibits "Careless & Reckless" operation of an aircraft.
A landing gear emergency is only an emergency when you are landing.
Another C-5 story. Pilot at Travis AFB (NorCal) gets an unsafe nose gear light, a fly by reveals the door is open but the nose gear is up. The aircraft diverts to Altus AFB OK where repairs can be made easily. The C-5 tanks up enroute and when he gets to Altus they don't want him to land because the only runway (then) will be lost and base birds don't come back for another 4 hours.
The C5 holds at high altitude until 2:00am before the runway can be closed for the night. The runway is foamed and the C5 lands without a nose gear.
Of course by this time 15,000 people have got wind of this and have picked a spot like to Rose Parade was going by.
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