The first hint at what sort of airport you are going to find comes as the undercarriage touches the tarmac and the nose wheel anticipates doing something similar in a few seconds time. We rush past a couple of dumped Soviet cargo aircraft (An-24s, or were they 26s? I blinked.), a Lockheed L110 and three…
I have seen some in my time but I think this one is a favourite. Airports that is. Not because it glitters (Changi does a better job of that) but because it is such a melting pot. It gives true meaning to the word “exotic”. Two lads are trilling with excitement in the coffee shop…
We have become docile travelers, tamed and very compliant. Watch us be herded around the appallingly designed Terminal 4 of LAX by TSA teamsters trained (by Heathrow strumpets I imagine) in the cattle yards of Texas and who consequently have little discernible notion of what service looks or sounds like. Service is not their mission.…
While the new airport is currently being built (a massive enterprise which we are all looking forward to seeing complete – the current airport crowds and bustle resemble the New Delhi railway station, not a first world air port) you can find yourself being shuttled to and from you aircraft by bus and walking to…
The taxi down the runway after landing at Sanaa, the capital of Yemen, is the first hint that this place is a little extraordinary. Here are Su22 and MiG29 Soviet aircraft flying circuits (here is one with its parachute still dragging), and a number of them parked in their revetments. For a plane spotter it…
I see the International Air Transport Association (IATA) have grumped about the apparent security mess at Heathrow. Glad they have said what the rest of us were thinking. Especially when they seem so out of step with everyone else. Especially the ridiculousness of the one bag rule. Never mind that the screeching middle aged women…
A clear spring day. Sunday morning and in this part of the hemisphere the sun has been up since before 5am. It now glances white light off the American Airlines 777 sitting beside us. It is a marked change to the inbound flight last week when the day was overcast and the feeling of depression…
Security is always about trade offs. If I want to get to my destination I will put up with the impositions of removing shoes, stripping laptops in and out of their bags, handing over my bottle of water. And tolerate people handling me in a way that would earn them a quick uppercut to the…
