Wow! I rarely post here (being afraid of the moderator Sr. Medina) but thought I'd pass this along.
As some of you know our home, Xanadu, is in the hills above and between Sosua and Cabarete so we have a clear view between Puerto Plata, Sosua, and Cabarete, including the airport.
While taking a break from programming around 2:00-2:15 this afternoon I wandered out by the pool and watched a small Cessna buzzing overhead, away from the POP airport. Over the beach at about 1000 feet heading west was a helicopter that we see often flying up and down the coast. A few miles behind the helicopter, who was really moving was a 727 approaching fast from Cabarete. As I watched the Cessna droned a few hundred feet over head toward La Cienega, the helicopter and the 727 continued on to the airport. Following the Cessna I looked up and saw a much larger jet, coming from the southeast in the direction of Punta Cana, from the bottom up! Both wings in profile as he made a nearly 45 degree hard bank and climb off to the North, then East off toward Cabarete with his engines screaming. To my amazement just as he disappeared into a shower off Cabarete another 727 entered from the southeast, and also immediately banked into the pattern. The Cessna reappeared and followed the first jet into the airport so close I'd have been nervous about eddies from the first jet if I'd been a pilot. Before he disappeared below the horizon and landed, the second jet imerged from the clouds now heading due west on approach to POP behind the Cessna. At the same time the third jet was just disappearing into the clouds starting his big circle. At this point yet a fourth jet enters from the North, banks left (east) and tails number three while a fifth enters the hold from the southeast.
I was stunned! In 2-1/2 years here at this house I've never seen anything like it.
It took them over 45 minutes to get them all out of that stack and back into the airport. Obviously they weren't handling the traffic very well or they would have adjusted their courses further out so they were in a nice tidy train rather than circling "stacked". But, it ain't O'Hare! I wonder what they did with all those planes once they hit the ground. Must have been mayhem!
Only thing I can figure is the peso just hit 100:1 today and everybody decided all at once to go have a cheap $100 Dominican vacation. LOL.
Tom aka XR Actually, I am a rocket scientist.
As some of you know our home, Xanadu, is in the hills above and between Sosua and Cabarete so we have a clear view between Puerto Plata, Sosua, and Cabarete, including the airport.
While taking a break from programming around 2:00-2:15 this afternoon I wandered out by the pool and watched a small Cessna buzzing overhead, away from the POP airport. Over the beach at about 1000 feet heading west was a helicopter that we see often flying up and down the coast. A few miles behind the helicopter, who was really moving was a 727 approaching fast from Cabarete. As I watched the Cessna droned a few hundred feet over head toward La Cienega, the helicopter and the 727 continued on to the airport. Following the Cessna I looked up and saw a much larger jet, coming from the southeast in the direction of Punta Cana, from the bottom up! Both wings in profile as he made a nearly 45 degree hard bank and climb off to the North, then East off toward Cabarete with his engines screaming. To my amazement just as he disappeared into a shower off Cabarete another 727 entered from the southeast, and also immediately banked into the pattern. The Cessna reappeared and followed the first jet into the airport so close I'd have been nervous about eddies from the first jet if I'd been a pilot. Before he disappeared below the horizon and landed, the second jet imerged from the clouds now heading due west on approach to POP behind the Cessna. At the same time the third jet was just disappearing into the clouds starting his big circle. At this point yet a fourth jet enters from the North, banks left (east) and tails number three while a fifth enters the hold from the southeast.
I was stunned! In 2-1/2 years here at this house I've never seen anything like it.
It took them over 45 minutes to get them all out of that stack and back into the airport. Obviously they weren't handling the traffic very well or they would have adjusted their courses further out so they were in a nice tidy train rather than circling "stacked". But, it ain't O'Hare! I wonder what they did with all those planes once they hit the ground. Must have been mayhem!
Only thing I can figure is the peso just hit 100:1 today and everybody decided all at once to go have a cheap $100 Dominican vacation. LOL.
Tom aka XR Actually, I am a rocket scientist.
