[Leica] Planes Landing at old Kai Tak Hong Kong

[jayanand at gmail.com (Jayanand Govindaraj)]

I remember Kai Tak well, it was a fairly voyeuristic final descent, looking
into people's bedrooms and kitchens in the apartment blocks on the glide
path. At least it felt that way...(-:

Cheers
Jayanand



On Thu, Jul 4, 2013 at 4:00 AM, H&E Cummer <cummer at netvigator.com> wrote:

> Hello Luggers,
> I have been sorting through my old photo CDs from the 1990's and came
> across the following shots taken from the top of the parking garage at Hong
> Kong's Kai Tak airport a few weeks before the airport closed forever.
> People with a sense of history flocked to the airport to take pictures of
> the planes landing and as you can see they did get close. In the 60 plus
> years that Kai Tak (named after Mr. Kai and Mr. Tak - who owned the land
> where the airport was built) was Hong Kong's international airport there
> was never a crash on approach although a few airplanes did skid off the end
> of the runway at the other end - into the stinky "Fragrant Harbour" (Xiang
> Gang = Hong Kong).
>
> A few gawkers at the parking garage:
>
> <
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/KaiTak1998/KaiTak1998W.jpg.html
> >
>
> http://tinyurl.com/kh2yohv
>
> Here are Anna (now 36 and Miss O's Mom) and Katie (now working at Hong
> Kong U and studying for her Phd)
> and me (fatter then than I am now) on the top of the garage with a Cathay
> Pacific (CX) plane in the background.
>
> <
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/KaiTak1998/CXKaiTakAKHw.jpg.html
> >
>
> http://tinyurl.com/k7w3yju
>
> Here's a straight on view of another CX 747 also in new  (for then) livery:
>
> <
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/KaiTak1998/CXNewLivW.jpg.html
> >
>
> http://tinyurl.com/mq4amp3
>
> And here's a vertical shot of a CX 747 in its old colours. Anna and Katie
> are just in the right hand lower corner of the photograph.
>
> <
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/KaiTak1998/CXVertKTw.jpg.html
> >
>
> http://tinyurl.com/mrkd2j9
>
> And lastly here we are, Anna, Katie and me, further down the roof of the
> car park - away from the crowds - with a China Airlines 747 in the
> background.
> The group shots of the three of us were taken by John our driver.
>
> <
> http://gallery.leica-users.org/v/Howard+Cummer/KaiTak1998/ChinaAirW.jpg.html
> >
>
> http://tinyurl.com/mxe95p5
>
> The approach to Kai Tak meant aiming the landing aircraft at a checker
> board set on a hillside of Kowloon and then turning the plane at the last
> moment into the final approach to the runway.
> There are several Youtube videos showing this approach - including a
> couple of near misses (Thai Airways landing in a cross wind)
>
> <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lx3Ccs5tKfw>
>
> The old ways of the old days may not have been better but they were
> certainly fun!
>
> Please look large - C&C always welcome.
>
> Howard
>
>
>
>
>
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