Comments on: Letter From Maho Beach

By: Rick Draper

Rick Draper — Sat, 05 Nov 2022 20:55:08 +0000

If winds merit this, can a jet land at St Martin from the opposite (mountain) side?
Thanks

By: Joe

Joe — Wed, 02 May 2018 18:16:11 +0000

I have been at St. Maarten and our family has had a home now for 30 years or more. I knew this airport and beach before the runway expansion. I have also flown airplanes (no jets)and from my perspective it isn’t the approach for a jet that is difficult. It seems to me it is the procedure for a missed approach. There is a pretty big mountain so a hard right turn on accent is what is important.
As far as the beach I remember it when it was much larger and despite the runway it was a nice place with a good party going most of the time.

By: Thomas

Thomas — Sun, 25 Mar 2018 21:57:52 +0000

In reply to Ad absurdum per aspera.

Planes coming in to land over Maho beach are heading directly into the prevailing wind. The runway at SXM is perfectly aligned with the north-easterly trade wind.
In English St. Martin and the neighboring islands are called the Leeward Islands, which doesn’t make much sense. For these islands to be on your leeward side, you would have to be out on the Atlantic Ocean. But then you have all of the Americas on your leeward side, and not only the Leeward Islands.
In German the Leeward Islands are called “Inseln ueber dem Wind”, which means “islands above the wind”. The islands along the southern edge of the Caribbean (e.g. Curacao) are called “Inseln unter dem Wind”, “islands below the wind”. This makes a lot of sense. If you were on a sailing ship in the middle of the Caribbean, and you wanted to get to one of the “islands above the wind”, it would be a hard up-hill slog. Going to the “islands below the wind” would be no sweat.

By: JAFD

JAFD — Wed, 28 Feb 2018 20:16:05 +0000

Greetings from Newark !

If the wind is from N or E, the parking lot at the Ikea in Elizabeth is right across the Turnpike from the landing zone, and, if weather is inclement, you can go to the restaurant in the Ikea and watch through the windows.

If wind from S or W, the parking lot of the Ironbound Recreation center, St. Charles & Komorn Sts, SE of Ferry Ave, NW of the US 1-9 viaduct – https://www.google.com/maps/@40.7261981,-74.1449717,16z – is in a safe neighborhood and has good view of planes on final approach.

If you need to hit the restroom, a pleasant request at the desk of the Recreation Ctr – entrance around the corner on Rome St – should work, and the shop at Teixeira’s Bakery – Kossuth & Magazine Sts, three blocks away – will drive away hunger till dinnertime.

By: Pedro

Pedro — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 00:45:50 +0000

In reply to Frank L. Gravelly Point, close to Reagan Airport in Washington, was (or maybe still is) a nice place for plane spoting. I remember, around 1999, seeing there a near miss, of an MD landing and an A320 entering the runway at the same time. The MD, at something like 50 meters above the A320, diverted really fast.

By: Pedro

Pedro — Tue, 06 Feb 2018 00:40:38 +0000

Sorry for the woman that was killed. It seems to me that videos on the web about that plane spoting place makes people overconfident.

By: Frank L

Frank L — Tue, 31 Oct 2017 18:47:48 +0000

Another sad story in this issue. Where oh where can one go to “plane spot” these days?? 15 minutes from KEWR but a world away to try to spot any aircraft. Your arrested & in jail even if you look the wrong way! Today’s security, yet you can be 1 unfortunate victim of the “knockout” craze in NYC. Something wrong with this picture?? PATRICK, do really read these reply’s?? If so, a simple YES to the e-mail, and I will believe you.

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 06 Oct 2017 01:26:11 +0000

One of my duties while stationed in Germany, circa 1971, was to deliver troop manifests to RhineMain/Frankfurt airbase. My shortcut took me across the end of the active runway. At night on foggy winter nights I was sometimes surprised by a Lufthansa 707 at 50’over the top of my vehicle. The landing lights lite through the fog made the area glow.

By: Eirik

Eirik — Thu, 05 Oct 2017 23:08:55 +0000

In reply to Eirik. Oh get over yourself Eirik :(

By: Ad absurdum per aspera

Ad absurdum per aspera — Thu, 05 Oct 2017 18:10:39 +0000

Here’s a silly question. Doesn’t that runway, from that direction, have you landing with a tailwind? (My (mis)understanding is that the island is in the trade winds and usually gets ten or twenty knots ranging from the northeast or the southeast.) Why not operate from west to east — terrain obstacles? noise considerations? Or have I got it all bass-ackwards?

As for deliberately standing there, I can think of about a thousand better things to do on a tropical island vacation than expose myself to conditions that would call for personal protective equipment at work, but de gustibus…