TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin Is this St. Bart's or Saba airstrip?

Yikes!!! I think it's St. Barts, but not sure.

It's St. Barts but that Stop sign isn't French.

I'm not 100% certain but it sure looks like St. Barts from what I remember. I was there years ago and we were laying on the beach at the end of that runway (or to the side) and I recall one plane almost over shooting it. Scary for sure!

Definitely St Barth's..and it was agreed many years ago that "STOP" would be used on Euro signs including France rather than confusing people with "Arrete"

St.Barths !

Manpot has it right, on both the airport and the Stop signs.

St. Bart's!!!

Yep, St. Bart's, and a VERY entertaining airport to fly into! Wwwwwwwhhhhheeeeeeee!!

No kidding. My wife and I flew in there for a day and I was sitting right behind the pilot and felt like I was flying the plane. The take off though is beautiful as you get a great view of the Bay and yachts.

This happened on St Barts.
LINK

https://www.facebook.com/imaduro/videos/7229429530465257/

Video of landing

Came in too high with bad results. Thanks for posting that video.

Yup. That video makes it pretty clear. His initial approach was way too high. He needed to be just above the hill on the approach. Then he compounded it by not going around; instead he tried to correct his approach too late and ended up essentially "pancaking" onto the strip. They are lucky it wasn't a much worse result!

Engine stalled so no power to correct approach.

Agreed that the plane stalled. No indication the engine quit. The stall likely occurred when he tried to correct his approach too late by cutting back his throttle. As the flight instructor quoted in the article stated, he then failed to increase his throttle to regain control. Had he done so, he might have been able to abort the landing and go around for a new approach.

Instead, it seems he remained focused on continuing with the landing and ultimately ran out of choices. It's always a concern when landing on short, steep strips with added hazards, such as St. Barth's and Saba. You have to have firmly in your mind when and what you are going to do if the approach goes wrong, long before you even start. PJIA has some of the same issues, albeit with a longer runway, but also bigger aircraft.

In any case, it's fortunate that everyone was able to walk away unscathed. 👍