GothamSpotter From United States of America, joined Jan 2005, 586 posts, RR: 0 Posted (3 years 4 months 2 days 23 hours ago) and read 4271 times:
Popular Mechanics today published a list of the 18 strangest airports in the world...of course not the first list like this, and it includes many of the usual suspects, but a few interesting choices too.
directorguy From Egypt, joined Jul 2008, 1569 posts, RR: 11 Reply 1, posted (3 years 4 months 2 days 23 hours ago) and read 4210 times:
Glad to know DMM made the list. That airport is literally huge-too much capacity. There would be like one international flight at a certain time and they'd put it at Gate 72 or something. Good times
2H4 From United States of America, joined Oct 2004, 8950 posts, RR: 62 Reply 2, posted (3 years 4 months 2 days 23 hours ago) and read 4132 times:
AIRLINERS.NET CREW HEAD DATABASE EDITOR
Lovely reporting:
Quoting Popular Mechanics: Madeira is a small island far off the coast of Portugal, which makes an airport that is capable of landing commercial-size aircraft vital to its development. This airport's original runway was only about 5000 feet long, posing a huge risk to even the most experienced pilots
Yes, what a "huge risk", operating an aircraft within its performance envelope...
s4popo From United States of America, joined Nov 2008, 224 posts, RR: 0 Reply 3, posted (3 years 4 months 2 days 22 hours ago) and read 4030 times:
"Toncontin's runway is just over 7000 feet long and situated in a valley surrounded by mountains. Despite the stubby runway, planes as large as Boeing's 757 routinely land at the airport. Schreckengast tells PM that "Seven thousand feet is awfully short for 747s," let alone anything larger, and says that planes are forced to land and take off in the same direction because they won't be able to clear the mountains otherwise. "There's one way in and one way out," he says. Honduran officials have launched an initiative to reroute commercial traffic to the safer Soto Cano Air Base."
What are they talking about??? It's hard to take journalists seriously when they make such blatant mistakes.
avroarrow From Canada, joined Sep 2001, 1041 posts, RR: 0 Reply 4, posted (3 years 4 months 2 days 21 hours ago) and read 3475 times:
If you read it as a piece of lighthearted reporting it was an interesting list to go through.
Since we are all hardcore aviation geeks there will obviously be points we aren't happy with.
For Maderia, if you were flying a full load of pax in an A320 on a wet stormy night I'm sure you would be happy to have more than 5000 feet to touch down and stop in and of course the 747 mentioned in the Toncontin section was probably supposed to be a 757. Simple typo I guess.
Give me a mile of road and I can take you a mile. Give me a mile of runway and I can show you the world.
HAL From United States of America, joined Jan 2002, 2472 posts, RR: 53 Reply 6, posted (3 years 4 months 2 days 21 hours ago) and read 3295 times:
I love it! The last entry - Copalis State Airport - is one of my favorite flying destinations. Land on the sand, dig for some razor clams, fly home, enjoy the feast. It's a nice change from landing 767's on concrete.
HAL
One smooth landing is skill. Two in a row is luck. Three in a row and someone is lying.
Viscount724 From Switzerland, joined Oct 2006, 21679 posts, RR: 23 Reply 7, posted (3 years 4 months 2 days 20 hours ago) and read 2972 times:
Three other somewhat unusual airports have one feature in common -- they're located on islands and can only be reached by ferry from the city they serve.
Toronto City Centre Airport (YTZ), the hub of Porter Airlines. The airport was recently re-named Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport after a Canadian World War I ace (and Victoria Cross winner) and important figure in Canadian aviation in later years.
Prince Rupert (YPR), on the British Columbia coast 408 nm north of YVR. Now served by AC Jazz and Hawkair Dash 8s, it had jet service for many years in the past, up to 737 size. Before the airport was built on an island in the early 1960s, air service to YVR was by amphibious aircraft only.
Ketchikan, Alaska (KTN), only 78 nm from Prince Rupert above. Until the current airport opened in 1973, on an island separated by a fairly narrow channel from the city, KTN was served by a former WWII airfield on another island (Annette Island) about 20 miles away. Pan Am once served KTN with 707s from SEA. Now AS has about 5 daily 737 departures from KTN.
SJOtoLIR From Costa Rica, joined Jul 2007, 4128 posts, RR: 5 Reply 8, posted (3 years 3 months 3 weeks 4 days 23 hours ago) and read 2645 times:
Quoting s4popo (Reply 3): "There's one way in and one way out," he says. Honduran officials have launched an initiative to reroute commercial traffic to the safer Soto Cano Air Base."
This idea endured since the accident on TA390 SAL-TGU on May 30th 2008.
Some regular operations were temporary moved to Soto Cano Air Base which is located so far from Tegucigalpa downtown and it shows lack of essential services for passengers.
No more than six months after the mentioned event, all the operations returned back at TGU.
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