Reply to post: Re: It was *supposed* to turn the aeroplane

Re: It was *supposed* to turn the aeroplane

Vigie Airport (name now changed to protect the guilty) in St. Lucia is sufficiently notorious that no-one flies jets into it anymore. The first time BWIA (officially British West Indian Airways, mostly called Britain’s Worst Investment Aboard, But Will It Arrive, or Better Wait In Airport) flew a jet into Vigie the aircraft made a low approach over Castries, St. Lucia’s capital and home to about half of the island’s 120,000 or so population, and blew out multiple windows, including those in the French Embassy. If you land short you land in the sea. If you land long you end in the harbour. If you drift to one side you land on a beach, a very popular beach. If you drift to the other side you land on the terminal building. And there’s just one runway. BWIA put 727s and Lockheed Tristars into Vigie for reasons which must have made sense to them. Air Jamaica put various Airbuses into Vigie back when Butch Stewart owned Air Jamaica; Butch also owned two hotels on St. Lucia and considered Air Jamaica to be a way to deliver victims, that is, guests, to them. BWIA and Air Jamaica have merged and no longer fly jets into Vigie. Now only turboprops fly commercial into Vigie, flown by the crazy men who fly into other small islands in the Windward/Leewards and US and British Virgins. The old airport on Monserrat is actually worse than Vigie, the runway ends at the edge of a cliff, and the runway in St. Croix (I think) runs into the base of a hill, there was at least one accident were a 727 ran long and went into a gas station at the foot of the hill, with interesting results.