Asked the person who mentioned the airport and it was the old airport airport in Hong Kong. It was know as 'flying at the chequerboard'. What happened was that there was a chequerboard on the side of a cliff or hill and pilots had to aim for it and knew when to turn to land on the runway. I'd love to see a video of it if there are any or even photos would be good.

Dont think anyone has put this on but watch this for a landing.

Sun

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=2037500780

Just shown the video to hubby after he heard my reaction and his reaction to it is no thank you.

have to say I think I'd have been praying (silently) if I had been on that flight.

Not to sure if i would be praying or swearing for that landing.

looks like a good landing to me... we always said if you walk away its a good landing

There's nothing wrong with that landing, a little short of the piano keys but there's been lower than that at SXM.

There's plenty more videos from st Maartin on Flightlevel350.com and a video of the 'checker board' approach in to Tai Tak here

Darren

hi Darren just looked at martins footage they all appeared to be right on the spot for TD, in fact they all looked A! jobs.. so whears the worries

Brian

Couldn't see the checker board on the video. Looks a bit of a scary landing among the high rise buildings. i did see how they built the airport on an island somewhere on National geographic. Programme was Megastructures.

did anyone else see the programme about the plane that got hit by the ash from a volcano. Think it was when Mnt St. helens erupted, a plane had at least 2 engines on fire so dropped down low. The pilot had no idea what the cause was as when he dropped low, the fires went out. That was scary to watch.

cate_taylor,

That would be the BA 747 which actually had all 4 engine flame out due to the ash. Quite a scary experience I should imagine.

Darren

Back this January we had a bit of a "hurricane" here up north (I think it was the 19th Jan, the storm was at its worst between 11am-3pm) On the news that evening there was a video of plane doing a very scary landing at Manchester Airport, I think it was a 747 but I can't remember the airline, might have been PIA or Emirates. I'd love to see that video again, if anyone has a link for it. I remember seeing that same plane going over our house (just before my ridge tiles came down and all my garden trellis blew away) and I thought at the time the airport should have diverted flights elsewhere because the wind was so strong

cyberspacekadette,

Thursday 18th January is was, I remember it well. It took me 9 hours to get home when it would normally take me 45 mins because the motorway network ground to a halt with bridge closures and fallen trees. I remember seeing those dramatic pictures on the news. Manchester Airport, as well as other airports throughout the country did close for a time during the brunt of the winds, but reopened when they subsided. Rest assured, if it was too dangerous to land and the winds exceeded the airline / manufacturer SOP's, the aircraft wouldn't have landed until conditions were suitable. The video I remember on the news approaching Manchester was a Netjets Cessna 550 Citation being blown all over the place and a BA 747 at Heathrow as well. I don't think there was anyone daft enough to be out with the camera that day apart from the news teams. This video reminds me a bit of that day. This is some impressive airmanship given the conditions. So is this.

Darren

Darren, great vids, very impressive, thought 2nd one the best.

Good videos Darren - shame there's no link to the Manchester one - that was one scary day I wouldn't like to be on any of the planes on those videos.

I would! I bet you've been on approaches similar to that without even realising it, maybe not quite as extreme but similar. I remember coming back from St Lucia in to MAN a couple of years ago sat in row 5 of a 767-300 and I could see the runway out of the window on approach because of the crabbing of the crosswind approach, similar to the MD11 in the second video. I love landings like that! The skill level to keep on the glideslope like that is very high. It was hard enough when I flew a PA28 in to Blackpool with a 10kn wind from the right let alone gusting 39kn!

Darren