FINAL WORD
Blown off course By Dale Lawrence
S
pare a thought for the windswept inhabitants of St Helena. This volcanic tropical island in the south Atlantic sits about 1,200 miles west of the African continent and is part of the British Overseas Territory of St Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha.
boost tourism, create employment and prevent population decline. Former British Airways pilot Brian Heywood reportedly told UK Prime Minister David Cameron and Andrew Mitchell about the windshear problem at St Helena. In a letter to the St Helena Independent newspaper Brian Heywood wrote ‘if an airport is built on the edge of a near-vertical 1,000ft cliff, the prevailing wind is bound to cause problems’. Brian Heywood’s comments appear to be backed up by the video recording of the first test flight by Comair, a British Airways subsidiary in South Africa, that shows the 737-800 airline aborting its first attempt at landing.
Imagine the excitement of the island’s five thousand or so residents when they heard that the UK’s government spendthrift Department for International Development (DFID) would be funding the cost of an airstrip that would provide islanders with longoverdue air connectivity to nearby continents and boosting the island’s hopes for long-term tourism development. This £250 million infrastructure development on St Helena was signed off in 2010 by Secretary of State Andrew Mitchell (regarded by many as an outstanding Minister before resigning over the ‘plebgate’ affair) and the project was described at that time as ‘one of the biggest single government investments ever made in a UK overseas territory’. Alas, the hopes of St Helenians have been blown off course with the new runway closed indefinitely to large commercial traffic because of problems association with turbulence and windshear on final approach.
velop its tourism industry and become financially self-sufficient’. I have been unable to locate any explanation from DFID regarding feasibility studies on windshear for a cliff-top landing strip before committing a large wad of UK taxpayers’ cash to this undoubtedly worthy scheme. St Helena is only accessible by sea and the long-serving eponymous Royal Mail ship is due for retirement. Plans to operate connections with London and Johannesburg were designed to
One wonders what Napoleon Bonaparte would have made of it all. Bony was imprisoned on St Helena after his defeat at the Battle of Waterloo in 1815. He was billeted with the Balcombe family whose descendants settled in Melbourne, Australia and the ignominy of his exile was softened to some degree by a daily allowance of 17 bottles of wine (excluding Champagne) for him and his staff. He died on the island in 1821 in the wake of considerable political turbulence in Europe – but blissfully unaware of the issues of windshear.
The landing strip was due to be opened this summer and the relevant certification was awarded to St Helena airport in May 2016. However, pilots landing at the new airport reported major windshear problems, prompting a suspension of planned commercial services. The new airport is part of the UK’s government’s strategy to reduce the island’s dependency on state aid. A DFID spokeswoman stated that ‘we are helping St Helena overcome the challenge of being one of the most remote island communities in the world so it can de-
The views and opinions expressed on this page by Editor Dale Lawrence are entirely personal and do not reflect official BCCT policy. 68
The Link
Issue 2/2016