someone in the 74 crew sent me this
most dangerous airports in the world and i thought well there's literally no way i'm not going to do
a video on this i wonder how realistic it is most dangerous airports in the world coming up
hey 74 crew welcome back if you don't know me my name is kelsey i'm a 747 pilot
my channel 74 gear is all about aviation i really appreciate all of you in the 74 crew
for sending me videos like this that i would never find on my own and i am
so curious to see if this is even remotely realistic let's get into it luke law airport
this is the main airport that you would take if you were going to be visiting mount Everest
the airport is nestled between two mountains and the runway is extremely short because of
the elevation the plane cannot get any lights and very little electrical power also there are no
air traffic controllers therefore it is up to the pilot to safely touch down and land the plane on
their own it's up to the pilot to safely land the plane on their own also there are no air traffic
controllers therefore it is up to the pilot to safely touch down and land the plane on their
own clearly i've been doing it wrong this whole time apparently air traffic control is actually
supposed to land the plane and i'm just supposed to be up there to uh i don't know push the buttons
this is a very specialized airport meaning random pilots aren't going to be coming here
doing touch and goes at a place like this so you're only going to have specialized pilots who
are going to be very familiar with the area and so having air traffic control is not really necessary
in this case there's going to be a frequency that these pilots are all going to be communicating on
and so everyone's going to know and have kind of a layout or a pattern of the way in and the way
out and they're gonna be coordinating and the amount of traffic there i can't imagine is that
busy to require air traffic control but this part had me really confused because of the elevation
the plane cannot get any lights and very little electrical power so i'm assuming that they're
meaning the airport can't have lights and power not the plane because a plane can fly at that
altitude fine and it doesn't need to be hooked up anywhere to get ground power or electricity
it's able to generate its own electricity with the engine so i'm guessing they're meeting the airport
but here's something to keep in mind an airport like this doesn't really need lights planes aren't
going to be flying in there in the middle of night so you're only probably going to have a day
approach and in clear skies or relatively clear at least you're not going to have planes coming
in there at night time because of the mountainous area you're not going to have something like that
in a place like this this airport is dangerous but for none of the reasons what they mentioned it is
a relatively short runway it's only 1700 feet long and i didn't know that i had to look that up but
it's only 1700 feet long which is which is very short i would say your typical short airport that
you might see will be three thousand maybe four thousand that's going to be your short airport
that's not something that i will fly my plane into but you will see that and i've landed at runways
that are that short that would be a typical short runway so it's half that size so for that reason
there's some danger and it's also at a very steep slope pilots are used to landing on a flat place
typical runway is going to be flat and in my experience where there's been
humped runways you'll see some that have a big bump or a slight grade sometimes the
pilots will slam it in because they're not used to landing on something that's not flat
obviously there's going to be special training for these pilots to get into this place
so there isn't going to be the same problem as you would have as let's say me an airline pilot
used to landing on a flat surface if you put me on this runway it'd probably be a straight up
hot mess but the pilots that are flying this are going to get special training before they go there
another reason airport like this is dangerous is i'm guessing that there's very limited go
around procedures typically when a pilot messes up an approach to get onto a specific runway
they're able to do a go around and come back around again i think this is backed up to a
mountain so you'd have to make the decision to go around pretty early on it's not like you can have
a bad landing in this oh it's okay we'll just go around and try it again i think there is probably
a procedure for that but it's not going to be a typical one that you're going to see at an airport
and the third reason that a place like this is going to be dangerous is that the weather in
route going in through the mountains like that can change quickly so you might be in route to
a place like that there's not going to be any radar coverage from air traffic control
to help you get around those mountains and a plane of this size is going to struggle getting above
huge mountains like you see here so if you're in route and you get a bunch of weather that moves
in on the airport you're going to have to get out quickly because you get stuck in the weather
in a mountain valley like that it is super dangerous another risk for an airport like this is
the altitude it's a very high airport i think it's around ten thousand feet i've flown into airports
over eight thousand feet and so for us there's a lot of other things that we have to consider when
you're going into a high altitude airport like that so for that reason it's also a dangerous
airport but for almost none of the reasons that they mentioned is that airport really dangerous
courchevel airport this french airport is built into the alps when the pilot is ready to land he
must fly through a narrow valley for his descent the runway is also very short it is the shortest
runway of any airport in the world the runway is just .3 miles long if the pilot is not able to get
up enough speed to take off they will fly right off a cliff and hope that the plane stays in the
air another reason that takeoff is so difficult is that the runway has a downward slope of about 18.5
most pilots avoid using this airport at all costs shortest runway in the world it is the
shortest runway of any airport in the world i mean what about the one you just talked about
it's shorter the reason i know that is because i had just looked it up the airport we just talked
about is actually about 30 feet shorter and for those of you that don't use feet it's 10 meters
about 10 meters shorter than the previous airport so it's kind of strange they just
said it's the shortest in the world but they just literally talked about a shorter runway
right before this still it is a very short runway now a plane does need a certain amount of speed
to get ready for takeoff having this very steep downward slope of i think they said 18 degrees is
only going to help you gain speed though and then the part about going off a cliff and hoping your
plane stays in flight i mean let's just say if your plane did go off a cliff and you were going
too slow to take off the plane is going to pick up speed assuming you don't hit trees or rocks
as you go off that cliff you're going to plan to pick up speed and then be able to fly away fine
so that doesn't really make any sense that's not something that would be bad if you said if you
went off this edge of the cliff and into a pile of rocks that's a problem but not going off the cliff
and just flying away that would just pick up speed and you'd be flying not really a big deal they may
be confusing cars with planes having a heavily sloped runway makes it a challenge for either
landing and takeoff because it's not the way that we were taught how to land or how to take off
but this part most pilots avoid using this airport at all costs that makes no sense at all the pilots
aren't going to be planning to go to a certain place and go oh that airport's closed where should
we go let's go to this very difficult one that's in the middle of the alps that's at this very
high slope at this high altitude that's extremely short that's my backup plan that's not how it's
going to be so them saying that they try to avoid it at all costs that makes no sense people are
specifically going there either for the challenge or because it's a beautiful area to fly through
when you're on a commercial flight and you're flying to a destination the airlines usually book
a secondary a backup place to go to let's say that airport closes down for weather or who knows what
there's a backup to go to this airport is not going to be a backup and it's not like your pilots
are going to be flying somewhere and then that airport closes and the other one says i got a plan
might get us both killed but if it works it'll be a totally boss story cool to me this is what's
dangerous about this specific airport it's at a high slope so if you're landing in there's ice or
snow on there you're going to be skidding that's going to make it very dangerous when i've been
flying for the airlines i've landed on a place and the plane starts to get a little bit loose because
of ice it definitely startles you because that's a lot of momentum to move around the smaller
planes are going to have less momentum but it is still the same thing if you've ever driven a car
and you've been sliding around on ice it's a very uncomfortable feeling you don't have that much
control on my plane we have specific things we can do to try to mitigate the risk or reduce the risk
but on a very short run like this there's not a lot of options and the guy who's doing this
narration he's doing a good job and his voice definitely adds to the drama but it would be
more dramatic if they said something like and this airport is only one thousand centimeters
longer than the one in lucola you know you know it sounds a little bit more dramatic than 10 meters
longer sounds a little bit more dramatic tonkotten airport this is yet another example of an airport
that is located between the mountains with very rough terrain in order for a pilot to prepare
for the plane's descent they would need to make a 45 degree turn if they're going to reach the
runway which is located in a valley once they make the turn they would need to drop their altitude
quickly if they don't the plane can scrape the terrain underneath resulting in a crash only the
most skilled pilots attempt a landing at this airport no offense to any of the pilots who fly
here but the ones who go here are the ones that are specially trained to fly to this airport and
the ones that have it show up on their schedule it's not like the top gun of airline pilots are
the only people who can fly into this specific airport but i found this part really funny in
order for a pilot to prepare for the plane's descent they would need to make a 45 degree turn
if they're going to reach the runway a 45 degree turn into a runway is pretty standard that's
nothing that's special it's called a dog leg a lot of times if you're on a visual approach you'll
come at a 45 degree angle to then turn into the runway we call that a dog leg so that's not weird
crazy dangerous at all i decided i'm going to pull up the charts they have a chart for this airport i
figure some of you may have flown into honduras or want to fly to honduras so let me pull this chart
up just so you understand there's maybe two parts to getting into an airport imagine you're flying
in the sky that's going to be your freeway so you're on the freeway and then the route from the
freeway to your neighborhood that's going to be an arrival chart it's going to give you a map to get
to the airport it's going to have a path to be on and then you're going to have when you get into
that neighborhood the one that gets you from that to your house so you kind of have two different
charts that you look at when you're getting off from the main freeway to get to your house
this first one i'm going to look at is getting you from the freeway to your neighborhood this is the
part he's referring to right here and there are a few different ways you can get into this airport
but this is the treacherous 45 degree turn here's what this says when you're at this point you need
to be above 10 000 feet and when you're at this point you need to be above 8 000 feet
and then once you're here you're in this death defying 45 degree turn to get into the runway
and there's actually a more complicated one which they didn't bring up which i thought was strange
these are some more of the ones from the freeway to get you into your neighborhood these are all
the altitudes it's basically saying you have to keep above each of these altitudes as you come
in to the airport and this one right here is 8 000 feet and then you're going to be landing from here
and then he mentions about the steep descent from there to come in and land once they make the turn
they would need to drop their altitude quickly so you know a typical descent rate that your plane
will be on if you've ever flown in a commercial plane before is three degrees three degrees is
typically the rate of descent that we're taking as we're coming in to land on a runway now that is
the norm everywhere in the world so there will be some airports that have a steeper pitch but three
degrees is the norm so that's the norm let's take a look at this runway it has one approach here
you see right here that's three degrees and this other one is 3.2 degrees so buckle up you're 0.2
degrees steeper on the approach which is not a big deal i've done steeper approaches than that before
your typical commercial aircraft are not going to fly in anywhere that is going to be very
high risk for you as a passenger it may look high risk because they're flying close to the terrain
but there's a certain parameter that every airliner has to follow to have terrain clearance
and you saw on that plate it has certain altitudes at those altitudes the planes are going to be safe
and the autopilot gives you protection you have all kinds of different checks and protections
to make sure that the plane is not going to be anywhere near the mountain the real danger for
coming into an airport like this is actually going to be a direct flight from like new york
or boston in the middle of winter and the reason is is that once you actually get into honduras
in the middle of winter it's going to be so warm you're most likely going to get sunburned because
you haven't seen the sun in two months so that's the big risk of flying into this airport princess
juliana airport this airport was initially built for small planes this is why the runway
is just 7148 feet long in order for a large plane to land safely it needs at least eight
thousand two hundred two feet when the tourist industry in the area started booming the airport
began bringing 747s and a340s in its regular air traffic rotation another reason that this
airport is so dangerous and unique is that there is a public beach located right before the runway
when planes land huge gusts of wind and sand come up this is a problem for the people at the beach
when he started talking about the 747s and then had the picture of the a340 the airport began
bringing 747s and a340s in its regular air traffic rotation i was like oh please just say 747s and
show an a340 that would be great if you're new to plane spotting you're new to the channel or
you want a really easy plane to identify the a340 is a very easy plane to identify because it's just
one level here you can see with the windows it's just one level and it has four engines most four
engine planes that you're going to see are going to have at least two levels but there aren't a
lot of those flying anymore but just so you see it one level four engines a340 pretty easy then
they talk about the runway length this is why the runway is just 7148 feet long now it's possible at
the time of making this video which i don't know when it was that it was that short i actually just
looked it up it's 7546 feet now now that is a short runway i will say though when i was a new
pilot on 747 i landed continually and regularly on a pretty short runway that was 8 200 feet or
what did they say 8 200 is the minimum so i landed on a runway that was that length all the time when
i was a new pilot on the 747. so it can't be that dangerous of me as a new pilot can figure it out
there's all kinds of protection as well in our landing information when we get information to
land on a specific runway there's all kinds of buffers for brakes for the speed brakes
all kinds of different things that are built in for protection so we don't go off the end of the
runway and then he said this which i found pretty funny in order for a large plane to land safely
it needs at least eight thousand two hundred two feet so you're saying that jumbo jets have
been landing there for years but they're doing it unsafely don't let these types of videos scare you
airline pilots are big wimps we're never going to fly anywhere that we think that there's a chance
of us dying it's definitely not worth our paycheck to fly in somewhere and if we don't die you won't
die so it's kind of a win-win this video actually has a bunch more of these scary airports to go
into so i'm just gonna have to make a part two to this video if you wanna see some actual poor
choices that some pilots are making check out this video here and if you wanna see something a bit
funnier watch this video up here i look forward to hearing from you until then keep the blue side up