As Hong Kong opens its new Airport, Roger Thiedeman makes a nostalgic journey

Farewell to Kai Tak

The rumble of the un- dercarriage emerging from its 3-hour hibernation confirms that touchdown is not far away. Already, passengers aboard the Air Lanka Airbus A340 inbound from Colombo and Bangkok have folded away their tray tables, returned seat backs to an upright position, and fastened their seat belts in preparation for landing.

Approaching almost any other airport in the world, the giant Airbus jetliner would still be several kilometers from its destination. The pilots would have the runway more or less straight ahead and neatly lined up in their sights. But not on this flight. As the aircraft descends to a mere 700 feet, a crowded skyline consisting of multi-storey housing blocks and nearby hills fills the front windshield.

But where is the runway? While passengers in left-hand window seats ponder that question, they might notice a hill, almost within touching distance, red and white squares painted on two of its concreted sides. And just as these enormous checkerboards' begin to drift past, seemingly too close for comfort, the left wing heaves upwards as the Airbus makes a sharp turn to the right.

Simultaneously, the right wing plunges downwards, playing 'chicken' with television antennas and clothes lines atop the apartment buildings. Unsuspecting passengers in right-side window seats are filled with consternation. How much lower can this plane go before disaster becomes inevitable?

Just beyond the airplane windows one observes a hundred human dramas being played out in a hundred high-rise apartments. Here, an elderly gentleman watching the news on TV, seemingly oblivious to the big jet screaming past his window. Over there a family sitting down to their evening meal, the A340 so low and close it is almost possible to see "wok's cooking"!

Meanwhile, on the flight deck the two AirLanka pilots are at their busiest for the entire flight. They have just executed a 47-degree turn, the manoeuvre that had a few nervous passengers beseeching their favourite deities for deliverance from danger. And the reason for the sharp turn? The runway is now in sight. Alleluia! But not directly ahead. It lay over to the right just before the turn commenced.

Yet this is no ordinary runway. All but a fraction of its length juts out, like an accusing finger, towards the murky waters of the surrounding harbour. Any margin for error here is minimal.

The flight deck crew are concentrating really hard, carefully watching and waiting to align the A340's nose with the centreline of the runway which is rapidly getting larger and closer. Finally, when all looks good, with the Airbus only a hundred or so feet off the ground, they haul the airplane's wings back to a level position.

Now, things really start happening in fast-forward (and fast-downward!). The aircraft, skimming over a tangle of elevated roadways, gets closely acquainted with a double-decker bus. In a playground just outside the airport boundary fence, children are rapt in their basketball game. They scarcely notice the Air Lanka Airbus despite the hot blast from its engines fanning them from directly above. Then, the fence itself slips by in a flash.

In what seems like the blink of an eyelid, the A340 sinks closer to earth. To its left, the passenger terminal and control tower. To the right a small flying club. The black-and-white 'piano key' stripes and a large number '13' painted on the runway threshold disappear beneath the belly of the Airbus. Ten wheels settle down on terra firma, ten tyres squeaking their relief in unison. Seconds later, the twin nosewheels follow suit.

Another exciting approach and landing has just been accomplished at runway 13 (pronounced "One-Three"), Kai Tak International Airport, Hong Kong. The tired passengers trooping off the A340 in a few minutes' time will scarcely realize they have just participated in one of the world's greatest aviation experiences. A unique experience that had its origin 74 years ago and, from tomorrow, will be no more than a memory.

Like the memory and dream of two Chinese businessmen, Dr. Kai Ho Kai and Mr. Au Tak. In 1924 this entrepreneurial pair bought a block of low-lying, marshy land just east of Kowloon for reclaiming and development as a resort.

Not unlike many other property developers before and after, Messrs. Kai and Tak soon ran out of money, and their newly-reclaimed land defaulted to the British administrators of Hong Kong.

The government was not interested in resorts and recreation facilities. They converted the vast tract of real estate into an aerodrome for the Royal Air Force instead. While Kai, Tak & Co. may have faded into oblivion, their names gained immortality when RAF Base Kai Tak opened for operations in 1927. Over the next few years Kai Tak continued to expand, but its greatest boost came, ironically, when Japan invaded Hong Kong in 1941.

Using prisoner-of-war labour, the Japanese built two intersecting runways of differing lengths.

After the British returned to Hong Kong at war's end, the smaller runway was deleted and the longer one extended further, to be replaced later by another of even greater length.

Like its predecessor, this new runway was aligned south-east/north-west, each end pointing at the compass directions 135 and 315 degrees respectively. By international aeronautical naming convention, the two ends of Kai Tak's single runway are known as 'One-Three' and 'Three-One' (the third digit, in this case 'Five', is never used).

As Hong Kong grew like Topsy into one of the world's most important commercial cities, and a major attraction for tourists and shoppers, Kai Tak had to grow apace. The new generation of larger, heavier jet aircraft also demanded a longer landing and take-off run.

So, with each extension of the now-famous runway, more land was reclaimed from the clutches of Hong Kong harbour. Today, the runway at Kai Tak stretches to a length of 3,331.5 metres (10,930 feet).

Landing from the seaward, or 'Three-One' end of Kai Tak involves a fairly conventional, straight-in, over-water approach. Although here too pilots must be mindful of hills on either side as they negotiate the Lei Yue Mun Gap.

But it is the more usual Kowloon, or 'One-Three' approach, that makes Kai Tak unique among the world's airfields. Even before the concrete high-rise jungle in and around Kowloon began reaching skywards, there were always those brooding hills, presided over by Lion Rock, just north-west of the airport and in line with the runway.

To prevent contact with this unforgiving terrain, a series of flashing strobe lights was installed marking out the curved approach path aircraft must observe when landing from this end. Pilots basically 'follow the dotted lines' represented by the flashing lights (some mounted on the roofs of those multi-storey blocks) as the planes descend between hills on one side and high-rise buildings on the other.

Incidentally, these are the only flashing lights you will see on the city skyline. So as not to confuse aircrews, with possibly disastrous results, the kaleidoscope of Hong Kong's neon advertising signs, in all their colour and garishness, remain static in a frozen tableau.

Supplementing the stroking approach lights is another landing aid which has become synonymous with Kai Tak. Remember those gigantic red and white squares observed to the left of the low-flying Air Lanka A340? Situated on the hillsides of Lok Fu Park, this visual aid serves as an aiming point and tells pilots when to commence their right turn. But only if the runway is in sight. Should the runway be concealed by fog, rain or low cloud by the time the checkerboard is reached, the landing must immediately be abandoned and another attempt made, or the airplane diverted to an alternative airfield.

Today Kai Tak ranks as the world's second largest airport in terms of cargo handled. It is the fourth largest where passenger traffic is concerned. Each year over 28 million passengers pass through Kai Tak, a number comparable to Tokyo's Narita at an airport one-third Narita's size. But these impressive statistics come at a price. A seriously overcrowded Kai Tak can no longer cope with such an overwhelming demand on its geographically limited resources.

Which is why a larger airport for Hong Kong will soon relegate Kai Tak to a mere memory. Built on reclaimed land of Lantau Island, well to the west of Kowloon and free of obstructions, the new airport, Chek Lap Kok (CLK), features dual, parallel runways and other ultra-modern facilities befitting the new millennium. Operations at CLK are scheduled to commence tomorrow, Monday 6 July.

Not all pilots may agree, but today is a sad day in the annals of air transport. It will be remembered as the day when Kai Tak International Airport, Hong Kong — which grew from the failed dream of Dr. Kai and Mr. Tak — faded into the dim pages of history, never again to inspire a certain sense of adventure and excitement in passengers and aviation buffs alike.

More Plus * What of the old, the sick, the feeble? * CIS' Kandy section * The brighter side of cooperation * Tilak's seventh exhibition

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