Kai Tak Remembered

More than a decade has already passed since the former Hong Kong
International Airport at Kai Tak closed for business on July 6 1998 to
be replaced by the superb new facility built on reclaimed land at Chek
Lap Kok on Lantau Island. The two airports are like chalk and cheese;
one futuristic, the other was long past its sell by date; but there
are still plenty who mourn the demise of the old place. Many are
pilots who readily recall the adrenalin rush as they guided their
aircraft along the instrument guidance system (IGS) just a few hundred
feet above densely populated Kowloon tenements towards the infamous
orange and white painted checkerboard. When this was in view and the
aircraft correctly aligned at a height of just 675 feet (206 metres),
a sharp 47 degree turn was required to take the aircraft through a
sweeping curve before levelling out 150 feet (46 metres) from the
runway threshold.At night, a unique lighting system set precisely at
400-foot intervals on rooftops and specially built gantries guided
pilots towards the runway centre line. As final approach was imminent
the spacing between the lights decreased to 200 feet. The need to use
lights to guide pilots in this way, enforced a ban on flashing neon
signs throughout Hong Kong to avoid distracting inbound pilots. The
weather was often bad; typhoons, microbursts and severe crosswinds
added to the workload of pilots and in many respects Kai Tak was a
major accident waiting to happen. A few errant aircraft did end in the
shallow waters of Kowloon Bay and it was indeed fortuitous that no
commercial airliners ever came down on the crammed dwellings of
Kowloon or missed the turn to end up ploughing into Lion Rock. This
was due mainly to extremely good aviation skills, excellent air
traffic control and, more specifically in the early days, an amazing
element of luck. The airport certainly had its share of incidents and
many aviation enthusiasts will have seen the video on 'You Tube' that
shows how close a Korean Air Boeing 747 came to disaster during an
extreme weather landing.Mr Kai and Mr Tack
The story of the airport
dates back to the 1920s when two businessmen, Sir Ho Kai (a trained
medical doctor) and Mr Au Tack* (owner of a photographic business)
formed the Kai Tack Land Investment Company Ltd to reclaim land they
intended to use to build new homes. The project failed mainly because
few people desired to live on land that was still infested by
mosquitoes. The reclaimed area was left vacant until it was taken over
by the government. In November 1924 the Royal Navy ship HMS Pegasus
arrived in Victoria Harbour carrying four Fairey IIID seaplanes that
were used to conduct aerial photography. These were flown on aerial
reconnaissance missions over Mires and Hias Bays, the known haunts of
notorious pirates that plundered shipping on the South China Sea. Sir
Reginald Stubbs flew in one of these aircraft and in so doing became
the first Governor of Hong Kong to survey his territory from a
seaplane.There was obviously the need for a military facility within
Hong Kong but under the 1021 Washington Agreement the British were not
permitted to establish a base east of Singapore. The British
Government candidly found a solution by building an airfield for civil
use on the site that could also be used by visiting Fleet Air Arm
aircraft. In January 1925 American dare devil Harry W Abbott, was
granted permission to start a flying school on the site that he called
Kowloon City Field. On Lunar New Year Day he announced the
inauguration of his school by taking off in a Curtiss Jenny with fire
crackers attached to his rudder. But the fireworks failed to ignite
and this was considered bad fung shui by the watching spectators. His
colleague, the Chinese-American pilot Henry Yee Young, performed a
series of aerobatics before Abbott returned to the air with Richard
Earnshaw aboard who made a parachute decent. But things went badly
wrong and Earnshaw landed in the harbour, got tangled in his parachute
and drowned. A series of incidents continued to court Abbott and by
August he was broke and forced to sell his aircraft.The Royal Air
Force took over the airfield on March 10 1927 and apart from the
Japanese occupation during the War remained in some form until 1993.
The posting was not popular at first because of the pungent odours
emitting from the local nullah (open drain) that competed with the
smell of lard from a factory situated close by. The pungent nullah
continued to greet passengers aboard arriving aircraft right up to the
final days of the airport.On November 18 1928 a flight of Shorts
Southampton flying boats touched down in the harbour and were tied to
special moorings in Kowloon Bay. This was the famous Far East flight
of Group Captain Cave-Brown-Cave that was being flown from Singapore
to Australia that later evolved as 205 Squadron. In order to haul the
aircraft from the water a concrete slipway had to be built and a steam
crane was used to hoist the planes onto dry land. Things had started
to develop and the Legislative Council set money aside for
improvements and maintenance at the facility. By 1930 the runway had
been levelled and re-turfed and a metal hanger was completed to
replace the matting structures that were prone to catch fire. In
September Mr A J R Moss arrived from London to take up the position of
Aerodrome Superintendent followed by his assistant Erik Nelson five
years later to influence the development of the airfield.The Imperial
Link
In 1932 the flying club members became embroiled in a
disagreement that forced its closure. Vaughan Fowler, the prominent
manager of the Far East Aviation Company, suggested reforming the club
and it became the Far Eastern Flying School with a fleet of aircraft
consisting of one Avro Avian and three Avro Cadets. The business
employed a staff of ten Chinese, ten English and had forty two
engineering students; an indication of how interest in aviation had
progressed. Two years later the airfield was further developed with
the addition of a sea wall, a surrounding fence and a ramp for sea
planes. Work was also completed on accommodation for the RAF on the
eastern side of the old runway where buildings were erected on a dirt
track that led to the fishing village of Lei Yut Mun. These had a
commanding view over a sandy beach and stood 30 metres above the
airfield on land where blocks of high rise flats would later dominate
the backdrop on the eastern side of the airport. There were also plans
to tarmac the runway.In 1928 the British and Hong Kong governments
promised to spend �200,000 to convert Kai Tak into a modern facility.
In London the Colony was still given only secondary consideration and
it took until 1935 for a civilian control tower and offices to be
built and for the first fire engine to be acquired. On March 25 1929
the long awaited first commercial flight arrived when the de Havilland
DH 86 G-ACWD Diana Class 'Dorado' of Imperial Airways touched down.
This had operated the inaugural feeder service from Penang and Saigon
that had connected with the delayed UK to Australia (Empire Route)
flight that had departed from London on March 14. The experienced
Imperial Airways pilot, Capt J Lock was in command when he reported
seeing three sharks basking in the waters of the South China Sea below
his aircraft as he neared the Colony. Sweeping through an area known
as Magazine Gap at around 11.30am the magnificent vista of Victoria
Harbour opened before him and he was escorted on his approach by a
squadron of aircraft from HMS Hermes. Awaiting the flight was the
Governor of Hong Kong, Sir Andrew Caldecott and 200 VIPs who expected
to greet just the crew when the aircraft came to a halt. There was an
element of surprise when the first commercial passenger ever to land
at Kai Tak emerged from the plane. Ong Ee-Lim, a keen amateur pilot,
had squeezed between 16 bags of Her Majesty's mail after flying his
own aircraft from Kuala Lumpur to Penang specifically to be on the
flight.The Imperial Airways DH 86 had visited the Colony before when
Capt Armstrong had flown the aircraft in a series of proving flights
the previous year. The people of Hong Kong had followed the progress
of these flights for some considerable time and when poor weather
threatened the first of these, Armstrong not wishing to disappoint the
people or risk losing the precious mail contract flew 1852 miles (2980
kms) from Penang in a single day (September 16). When the route opened
to regular traffic it cut the 34 day sea journey between England and
Hong Kong to ten days by air. Later, when agreement was reached with
Siam (now Thailand) the shorter route via Bangkok cut a further day
and a half from the journey. By the time Imperial Airways had started
operating C Class flying boats to Singapore, the 15,000 mile (24,140
kms) route had been reduced to 5� days with the DH 86 providing the
final link between Singapore and Kai Tak. Today, due to the progress
made in establishing over-flying rights, shorter routes over Russia,
Siberia and China have substantially reduced the distance between
London and Hong Kong to around 6,000 miles (9,856 kms) that modern
jets can cover non-stop in less than twelve hours.Between the Wars
many famous long distance and round the world record breaking pioneers
landed at Kai Tak even though regular commercial services were slow to
commence. During 1932 the Compagnie Fran�ais Air Orient intended to
connect Hong Kong with their Marseilles-Saigon service but plans were
dropped. Two years earlier the Sino-Deutsche Luft Hansa owned Eurasian
Aviation Corporation had also proposed a mail route between Kai Tak
and Europe but this idea fell by the wayside, but later extended its
Peiping (Beijing)-Canton service to Hong Kong on June 29 1937 using
the versatile Junkers JU-52. Then, on August 10 1938 Air France
arrived from Paris in their Dewoitine 338 tri-motor F-AQBF 'City of
Vientiane' in six days before setting a new record between Hanoi and
Hong Kong in 3 hours 20 minutes.In February 1930 Juan Trippe's Pan
American Airways staked a 45 per cent share to form the Chinese
National Aviation Corporation (CNAC) in collaborated with the Chinese
Ministry of Communication. On October 8 they opened a flying boat
service linking Shanghai, Wenchow, Foochow, Amoy, Swatow and Canton
with Hong Kong using Sikorsky S-38s. Two years later they flew the
route twice-weekly using Douglas Dolphin amphibians, later introducing
the Douglas DC-3 as passenger traffic increased.Pan Am had been keen
to add Hong Kong to their trans-Pacific operations and on April 28
1937 this was achieved with the arrival of the Sikorsky S042B flying
boat (NC16734) 'Hong Kong Clipper' on the extended service from San
Francisco and Manila. By then the Japanese were already overrunning
parts of China and by July Peking had fallen. As a result, commercial
flights over China became inherently dangerous and regularly came
under fire from the Japanese. CNAC courageously continued to fly and
in 1938 a Douglas DC-2 of the company was shot down near Macau killing
all 14 on board. The aircraft was returned to Kai Tak by barge,
repaired and put back into service. In October 1940 and May 1941 two
more DC 2s were shot down with fatalities while flying the
Chunking-Kunming-Hong Kong service. The airline's final pre-war flight
departed from Kai Tak on December 12 1941 just as the Japanese
prepared to bomb the airport. The British military had already
declared Hong Kong indefensible and when the enemy invasion commenced
on Monday December 8 1941 the RAF had only three Vickers Wildebeests
based at Kai Tak and two Supermarine Walrus amphibians tethered
offshore. The airport continued to be strafed destroying six parked
airliners and Pan Am's 'Hong Kong Clipper' that was at anchor. Four
more airliners miraculously survived a bomb that went through the roof
of their hanger but failed to explode. Over the next two days CNAC
aircraft relentlessly evacuated airport personnel to China while the
RAF detachment moved to Hong Kong Island before the British
surrendered the territory on Christmas Day. The Japanese took Kai Tak
for military use but flights operated by Greater Japan Air Lines that
had served the airport in peace time continued. Two tarmac runways of
around 4,266 feet (1,300 metres) in length were constructed by
prisoners of war. Kai Tak was bombed many times from 1942 tom 1945 by
American forces with considerable success but it was deemed
impractical to mount any prolonged effort to remove the occupying
forces.Japan surrendered on August 15 1945 and the British
re-established their presence. Although Fleet Air Arm Grumman Hellcats
and Avengers flew into the airport on August 29 the runways were still
littered with bomb craters and the debris of wrecked enemy aircraft.
By mid-September the RAF had started to re-establish a presence with a
squadron of Supermarine Spitfires and by Christmas four squadrons had
become operational. Short Sunderland flying boats and Douglas DC-3
Dakotas were added to the mix of aircraft using Hong Kong. British
Overseas Airways Corporation (BOAC) had expressed their intention to
establish their flying boat services from Hythe to the Colony that had
been postponed at the outbreak of war. These services, using the Hythe
Class Short Sunderland commenced on August 24 1946. During the same
year a major typhoon hit the area wrecking several parked aircraft.
This was followed in quick succession by a Douglas Dakota military
aircraft crashing onto Kowloon Tong after take off.RAF squadrons came
and went throughout most of the post war period bringing with them an
assortment of aircraft including de Havilland Venoms, Hawker Hunters
and various helicopter types that were used for a range of duties
including search and rescue. The British military also deterred a
threat from Chinese Communist forces in the Pearl River Delta in the
late 1940s and played a role in helping to quell the Hong Kong riots
of 1967. From 1993 onwards the airport was home to the Royal Hong Kong
Auxiliary Air Force, the Hong Kong Volunteer Defence Corps Air unit
and later the Government Flying Service. The Hong Kong Aviation Club
also had their facility at a corner of the airport close to the
threshold of runway 13 that in later years provided an interesting
viewpoint for enthusiasts.Cathay Pacific and Post War Developments
In
October 1945 a former CNAC pilot, Roy Farrell, who had flown the
infamous eastern Himalayas 'Hump' between China, Burma and India
during the War bought an ageing Douglas C-47 that he had converted for
civilian use as a DC-3. He flew the aircraft from the USA via a
roundabout route to Shanghai where he met his old pal, former
Australian war ace, Syd de Kantzow. The friends formed an airline that
in February 1946 started operating cargo flights out of Shanghai. The
aircraft was registered VR-HAD and named 'Betsy' and the name they
adopted the company, Cathay Pacific Airways, became a legend. A second
DC-3 (VR-HDB) named 'Nikki' was added and the enterprise quickly
became extremely profitable causing trepidation among their Chinese
rivals. The situation had become 'unhealthy' in the old Chinese city
and Farrell and de Kantzow saw the wisdom of moving their operation to
British controlled Hong Kong. After advertising for air hostesses
Cathay Pacific began making trial passenger flights to Manila, Bangkok
and Singapore. A year later five more DC-3s and two Consolidated
Catalina PBY 5a amphibians were acquired second-hand as more
destinations were added. Catalina, VR-HDT 'Miss Macao' made history
when it was subjected to the first act of air piracy. On July 17 1948
four Chinese attempted to take control of the aircraft between Macau
and Hong Kong in the belief that gold bullion was being transported.
One of the hijackers was said to have had a basic knowledge of flying
the aircraft type but things went wrong when a struggle ensued and
Captain Dale Cramer was shot in the head. The aircraft went out of
control and crashed into the Pearl River Delta with a crew of three
and 23 passengers aboard. One of the hijackers was the only survivor.
On June 15 1972 a further incident occurred when a bomb aboard one of
the company's Convair 880s destroyed the aircraft over Vietnam.In 1948
one of the 'noble' British trading companies, John Swire and Sons
invested in Cathay Pacific. Farrell sold his stake in the airline and
returned to Texas in 1948 and de Kantzow resigned in 1951. The airline
grew substantially and is now one of the world's foremost operators.
Swire's main rivals, Jardine Matheson owned Hong Kong Airways that
also operated from Kai Tak. BOAC had invested in this airline to link
Chinese cities to its international routes, but in 1959 Hong Kong
Airways merged with Cathay Pacific. The airline also established a
highly reputable maintenance facility, the Hong Kong Aviation
Engineering Company (HAECO) at Kai Tak and in more recent years it
became a major shareholder in the two other Hong Kong based airlines;
Dragonair and Air Hong Kong.Since the War the structure of Kai Tak
continued to change to meet the rapid requirements of an ever changing
airline industry. During the 1950s the airport witnessed a massive
increase in regional and international operations. Many international
carriers including BOAC, Pan American Airways, Qantas, Air India,
Northwest and Canadian Pacific added Hong Kong to their schedules.
Douglas DC-4s and DC-6s, Boeing B-377 Stratocruisers, Bristol
Britannias and Lockheed Constellations were regular visitors and with
the turbo-props came the need for a longer runway. In 1958 a new 8,340
feet (2,542 metres) x 200 feet (60.96 metres) runway was opened on
reclaimed land at an elevation of 16 feet (4.87 metres) above Kowloon
Bay with overrun areas of 750 feet (228.60 metres) at the northwest
end and 300 feet (91.44 metres) at the water facing end. Over 3,000
workmen toiled on the project that commenced in January 1956 but
completed on time for the arrival of the first flight on August 31
1958. A parallel taxi-way and a new passenger terminal building were
also added. At the official opening of the runway on September 12th a
Comet 4 of BOAC specifically flown to Hong Kong from the de Havilland
airfield at Hatfield became the first jet airliner ever to land at the
airport. By the end of 1958 4,773 aircraft had arrived and 19 airlines
operated 184 flights a week to and from Kai Tak. On July 17 1959 a
Cathay Pacific DC-3 officially opened night operations into the
airport after additional lighting had been installed.In 1960 Pan Am
flew the first B-707 into Kai Tak followed in the same year by the
first DC-8 operated by Japan Air Lines. A milestone arrived when the
first B-747, Pan Am 'Clipper One' touched down on April 11 1970
witnessed by a vast crowd. The arrival of the wide bodied era brought
additional pressure to further increase the runway length. By 1974 an
extension had extended this to 11,130 feet (3,390 metres) and extra
taxiways, turn-off and parking areas and a new fire station had been
added. Traffic had increased to such an extent that by 1995-96 61
airlines using Kai Tak were contributing 2,850 passenger and cargo
flights and 230 non-scheduled flights weekly. 78 per cent of these
flights were wide bodied aircraft and this had increased the number of
passengers passing through the terminal to 28 million. The facility
had also become the world's second busiest cargo airport handling 1.48
million tonnes. With 31 scheduled movements per hour Kai Tak had
reached maximum capacity and hundreds of extra requests for landing
slots had to be refused. It was obvious that the new airport was
essential and when it opened for business at 6.20am with the arrival
of Cathay Pacific CX889 direct from New York it was not before
time.*For some reason the 'c' was dropped from the airport name
although it did appear as Kai Tack on the original gates.By Bob
Bluffield