I have heard tales about planes clipping the top of the fence. Indeed, at various times I’ve seen fence damage consistent with such a thing (though not the only way the damage could have occurred).
I’d read that the approach over water fools the pilot not familiar with the airport, and they end up flying lower than they think they are.
If you ask me: this doesn’t look safe!
Scroll the map to the other end of the same runway if you really want to be confused.
Perhaps the pilots get used to ground effect and that isn’t happening the same way with the water down that much lower ?
Could be a bit of that, but that’s why we have PAPIs I suppose, and a professional pilot is expected to be able to deal with various runway/terrain combinations. Having ocean up to the threshold is not unusual in anyway. I fly to a fairly limited number of ports, but four of them have runways that butt up to the ocean.
You should be over the piano keys at 50’* and touching down in the touchdown zone about 1000’ down the runway. If you follow the PAPI then it should take you to the touchdown zone on a 3º slope**. For most of the world, the landing distance required is calculated on the flight manual landing distance x 1.67, i.e., a 67% safety margin over the raw figures. This is because, unlike the guys who demonstrate the performance capabilities of the aeroplane, we are not test pilots and most of us are quite average, also old aeroplanes don’t necessarily perform as well as a new one straight from the factory floor.
So I don’t buy the idea that the approach is somehow deceiving or that the runway requires landing short in order to guarantee a safe landing. If you don’t have something close to the 67% safety margin mentioned above then you shouldn’t be landing there anyway.
There can be a general tendency for pilots to “duck under” the PAPI when getting close to the runway. Perhaps a bit of a habit learned from GA. Maybe an attempt to prevent floating past the touchdown zone. 99% of us have had this bad habit knocked out of us at some point in our training. However there will be the occasional pilot who comes in a bit low in the last part of the approach.
Where I work, our aeroplanes tell tales on us. If we crossed the threshold at 30’ instead of 50’ we’d hear about it from our safety department. I’d be surprised if Air France didn’t have a similar system but they may not be quite so anal about it as we are.
For the photos of St Maartens approaches I see two main possibilities or maybe a combination of the two.
- The pilots are showing off.
- There are low approaches occasionally at all airports but due to the excellent vantage point as this airfield, more photographic evidence is available there than elsewhere.
I’m sure there’s definitely an element of number 1 at St Maartens, what the balance is, I have no idea.
- The PAPI is calibrated to put the pilots eyes a certain height over the threshold, the rest of the aeroplane will be lower. Runways designed to take large aircraft are increasingly being fitted with PAPIs calibrated to higher eye heights (74’ is typical for a runway designed for an A380) to give more of a safety margin over the threshold.
** Some runways have steeper PAPIs due to obstacles on the approach path.
That’s in St.Martin, there is a beach on the opposite side of the island from the cruise ships, the planes fly right over your head! There are warning signs on a fence that tell you not to stand near the fence, but people stand there and hold on to the fence anyway. Google it for some cool pictures!
The first idea that popped into my head would (if it worked) take a wing off.
You’d need something pretty special to take a wing off. You’re talking about a structure designed, in the case of an A340, to bear the stress of many multiples of the plane’s weight (around 370,000 kilograms). Now of course the design stresses are mainly in the normal direction and it wouldn’t take as much force in other directions to do damage, but it won’t just fall apart if you fart at it.
A bunch of mortars firing weighted grapples attached to steel cables, anchored to a heavy vehicle, fired directly upwards into the path of the wing would (I think) stand a chance of sawing through the structure as they slipped over it due tl the plane’s forward motion.
This was the first video I ever saw of the beach, with a girl getting knocked down by the blast.
Here’s the account of American 625, a 727 that crashed on St. Thomas’ 4600 foot runway, killing 37 people. Pilot error. His wheels didn’t touch until half the runway was used up, he had the wrong flap setting, made bad decisions, etc. I was there when it happened.
That’s problematic on several levels, firstly where and how do you practice it? You’re going to have to get it to function correctly with the correct result first time, and you aren’t going to get a second chance.
Further I (hope) most airports would notice such a large vehicle parked at the end of the runway, you certainly couldn’t do it at St Maartan, what with all the thrillseekers milling around.
You would probably be better just using conventional mortars to hit the runway, terminal or parked aircraft if you wanted to cause carnage. Or just fire one directly at the aircraft as it came in to land, the IRA brought down several British army helicopters by those means.
http://www.neverenoughworlds.co.uk/twenty-years-ago-today-ira-mortar-attack-heathrow/
Quite important to land in the touchdown zone, not short and not long.
I haven’t been there, but I’ve been in a similar situation, jet blast on the beach.
The roaring wind is not the big problem, the problem is the sand, you literally get sandblasted.
Don’t do it when wearing a sunburn, not fun… trust me on that one.
And runway 27 is also runway 9 (90 degrees, or due east). Depends on which direction you are landing which is largely dependent on wind and traffic.
But Nicolas Cage did get turned into John Travolta, so there’s that.
Also to hit the brakes at that point, not the throttle.
Anywhere in the world. The practice phase doesn’t have to take place locally, and doesn’t require a plane.
The flight times are a in the public domain; the vehicle could be driven there minutes or seconds before the attack. The vehicle could be a large 4x4 or a boat.