What you’re about to watch is a Nebula original
meaning it was first released on Nebula—the
streaming site founded by myself and plenty
of other creators.
Producing this documentary was an enormous
project which involved flying myself and a
crew 10,000 miles to one of the most remote
places on earth, and it was entirely funded
by Curiosity Stream.
That’s because Curiosity Stream has partnered
with Nebula to offer a bundle deal where,
if you sign up at CuriosityStream.com/Wendover,
you also get a Nebula subscription—easy
as that.
On there you’ll find loads of other great
originals by independent creators, but for
now, to the documentary.
It was this precise moment, early on a Saturday
afternoon in October, 2017, that changed the
course of history for one of the world’s
most remote societies.
This moment that ended 500 years of isolation
from the world—cutting travel time to there
from six days on a boat to six hours on a
plane.
It was this small moment that changed everything
for the island—an island where the thing
they need most of all, as much as it might
hurt, is change.
It was this moment that long in the future
will be recognized as the single most consequential
ever for the island of St Helena.
You’d be forgiven for not knowing exactly
what or where St Helena is.
It’s not a place that one hears a whole
lot about.
If you have heard of it, that’s likely thanks
to Napoleon.
It’s here, on St Helena, where the infamous
Emperor of France was exiled by the British
for the six years preceding his death.
Since then, though, the island has been up
to quite a bit.
It’s now home to about 4,500 of the friendliest
people you’ll ever meet.
Walking a block through its capital of Jamestown,
it’s tough to go without saying hi and hello
a half-dozen times.
Driving past someone without giving a wave—well,
that's practically a crime.
Saints, as its residents are called, are as
proudly British as the come and fly their
Union Jacks copiously and conspicuously.
The island is, after all, a British Overseas
Territory.
Life on St Helena is quite unlike life in
the UK, though.
They’ve got their own money, their own accents,
their own culture, their own government, but
most of all, what makes life on St Helena
different is where it is.
The island sits in the same neighborhood as
nothing.
Mainland Africa is 1,100 miles or 1,800 kilometers
to its east.
Mainland South America is about 2,000 miles
or 3,300 kilometers to its west.
London is over 4,600 miles or 7,500 kilometers
to its north.
St Helena’s isolation defines and shapes
it, in absolutely every way—including, perhaps
most consequentially, economically.
You see, St Helena is not a wealthy place.
Its GDP per capita averages just above $12,000,
compared to about $40,000 in the UK.
The issue is that getting people and things
to and from the middle of nowhere costs a
great deal, so there just aren't too many
industries that can profitably operate on
a place as tiny and isolated as St Helena.
The Saints have found a few, though.
Beyond the traditional goods and services
sectors that any small community would have,
St Helena does have exports.
“We have some of the rarest coffee in the
world which sells for, I know, 90, 100 GBP
in the United Kingdom for just 100 grams.
If we could increase that to some extent,
that would bring revenue to many of the farmers
on the island.”
They also sell a good amount of tuna and honey,
but then there’s another sector that capitalizes
on the islands isolation.
“The predominant economy here at the moment
is there is niche tourism--diving, history,
walking tours, birdwatching, those sorts of
things--plus also a growing market of people
who want to get away from it all.
One week away from the Internet and given
the Internet prices here and that's quite
easy to achieve if you want to do it.”
But tourism would be nothing without a means
to get off and on to St Helena Island.
It was only recently that this became something
that the government had to worry about.
In the early days of the island’s human
history, shipping was what brought a population
to it.
It was the perfect stopping point on the route
from the far east to Europe around the Cape
of Good Hope—so perfect, in fact, that for
a while the entire island was run by the British
East India Company.
Eventually, though, the Suez canal opened
and so fewer boats would round the southern
tip of Africa.
This, of course, diminished St Helena’s
importance, but still, up until the 1970’s,
the island served as a regular stopping point
for ocean liners traveling between the UK
and South Africa, meaning there was reliable
link to the outside world.
But then, throughout the 20th century, as
air travel grew more popular and profitable,
passenger ocean lines around the world increasingly
struggled to fill their ships and one-by-one
closed down.
The last shipping line with passenger service
to St Helena collapsed in 1977, leaving the
island marooned—with no way to get to the
outside world.
The British stepped in, buying a ship for
their overseas territory which would be called
the RMS St Helena.
The RMS was part cargo ship, part passenger
ship.
In the front she carried dozens of shipping
containers, acting as the primary supply-line
for the island, and in the back she was adorned
with pools and bars and sun loungers.
Her regular journey consisted of the five
nights from Cape Town to St Helena, then she
would continue on to Ascension Island, in
two or three nights, where she would meet
and connect her passengers to one of the bi-weekly
Royal Air Force flights to the UK.
This method, via Ascension, allowed travelers
to get from the UK to St Helena in relative
speed—just four days.
Most, though, took the longer route from South
Africa.
Locals and tourists alike adored the RMS.
She was thought of as the perfect transition
from St Helena to the outside world or vice
versa.
She was a legendary, storied vessel, but,
after decades of heavy use shuttling passengers
to and from the island, in the early 2000’s,
the RMS was getting old and worn and the government
started to think about what would replace
her.
Initial assessments found that replacing the
ship would cost up to $100 million.
This led to the question: with that kind of
money, was a ship really the best option?
The answer, it turned out, was probably not.
After decades of feasibility studies, discussions,
debates, false starts, delays, and bidding,
a contract was produced, and with a few quick
signatures, life on St Helena would change
forever.
St Helena was getting an airport.
“The contract was signed in November 2011,
and that's when Basil Read arrived on the
island to start basically looking at the infrastructure
logistics.
They started the first construction or the
first moving of soil.”
“And obviously they built various roads
up to the airport because they had to get
the logistics up to the airport.
That was they had a ship that brought in all
the materials, logistics, all the spares,
equipment that had to obviously help to build
an airport.
So they constructed it over four years.
At the end of 2015, the runway was completed,
most of the terminal buildings were completed
most of CNS equipment, which is communication
and navigation equipment, was installed and
the airport was ready for a certification
at the end of October 2015.”
New airports are rare.
New airports in places that have never had
an airport before are even rarer.
Getting an empty husk of an airport certified
and staffed is no easy task.
For this to happen on St Helena, subcontractors
were streaming through the island; there were
audits upon audits upon audits; staff members
were recruited; locals were trained both on
and off island for jobs like security, immigration,
firefighting, and more; emergency procedures
were written; public meetings were conducted,
airport vehicles were shipped in; instruments
were calibrated; beacons and localizers and
obstacle lights were installed; a logo was
designed; calibration flights came in; emergency
drills were conducted; drone laws were codified;
operational trials were run; and then finally,
in February, 2016, the airport was certified
and ready to open.
Commercial flights could start, and St Helena
would achieve its decades long ambition of
having an air link to the outside world.
There was just one more step.
As one last hurdle of bureaucracy, Comair,
the airline contracted to operate flights
to St Helena, wanted to perform an implementation
flight, as they called it.
Essentially, they were to going to fly one
of their planes in to test that everything,
from the instruments to the runway to the
terminal to the fuel system, worked.
Now, Comair was really the perfect airline
to connect St Helena to the world.
They’re a British Airways franchisee meaning
they are contracted by British Airways to
operate their regional flights from South
Africa, and therefore fly a number of routes
around the region under the British Airways
brand.
The plan was for Comair to operate a British
Airways route nonstop from Johannesburg to
St Helena.
These flights would seamlessly connect to
other British Airways flights to the two locations
Saints travel most, Cape Town and London,
as well as with hundreds of other destinations
around the world.
With the exception of a direct flight to the
UK, there’s really nothing better St Helena
airport could have wished for.
They just had to do the implementation flight.
So, on one sunny, nearly cloudless April day
in 2016, a Comair 737 appeared off in the
distance to the north of St Helena airport
carrying a handful of staff members of the
airline and airport construction company.
It approached, wheels up, in order to perform
a fly-by above the runway, as planned.
After gaining altitude again, it circled back
around in order to make a second and final
approach.
But then, just seconds away from touchdown,
there was a sort of wobble, then another one,
then once its wheels were just feet above
the runway, the pilots elected to abort the
landing, go around, and give it another shot.
So, the plane circled around again, and, after
some more wobbling, came to a landing—the
first ever landing of a commercial passenger
jet on the island, even if it wasn’t carrying
commercial passengers.
St Helena was thrilled.
“I’m here with Basil Read’s island director,
Deon De Jager.
Deon, you just arrived on the first passenger
jet to land here on St Helena.
Can you describe the experience?
Uh, great experience.
I mean it’s just the cherry on the cake
after the four years work.
Friday morning I flew out, on the SA flight,
I went home, spent the weekend with the family,
played golf yesterday, and today I’m back
on the island.
I meant that’s the signs of the times and
that’s the whole reason for the airport
is to be able to travel back and forth as
you please.”
“Susan O’Bey and Graham Vest, guys, you
were here to witness the first ever passenger
jet land on St Helena.
First of all, you, Graham.
How does it feel?
Can you describe the experience?
It was absolutely amazing and I feel really
privileged to be here at this momentous occasion.
It really is such a historic event.
I feel absolutely wonderful.
I feel proud by everything that’s being
done by you guys on the island.
And you Susan?
Excited, extremely excited.
This is like the culmination of weeks, months,
years of hard work as far back as 2005 and
we’re really, really proud of everything
that’s been achieved today.”
“This is the first step.
You know, a plane landing on St Helena.
What does this now mean for tourism on St
Helena.
Well now we’ve got the gateway to get people
here.
Before we had to rely on the ship, the RMS,
coming back and forwards.
This means we can have a steady stream.
At first it’ll be that Saturday flight,
people will get used to and then once that
starts filling up hopefully we’ll have a
mid-week one and that’s the way we can really
develop tourism and it becomes worth people
investing in—restaurants, bars, other things
that will help the tourists here.
So, the start of a new era for St Helena.”
Everyone was ecstatic, but at the time, none
fully understood what had just happened.
You see, this little wobble, just before landing,
had just derailed the decades-long plan for
St Helena’s new era.
That wobble was evidence of wind-shear—a
phenomenon where wind traveling in one direction
meets wind traveling in another direction
and creates a zone of turbulent air.
In St Helena’s case, its wind shear was
due to the already strong wind being pushed
around and rerouted by the enormous cliffs
at the northern end of its runway.
When coming in to land an airplane, wind is
already a hassle, but when it quickly shifts,
as in the case of wind shear, it can be a
lot worse.
The first sign to the general public that
something was wrong was when the St Helena
Government postponed the long-scheduled airport
opening ceremony, which was planned to be
presided upon by Prince Andrew.
Eventually, it emerged that the solution would
be to land planes from the south as there
was not a wind-shear issue from this direction,
but this did have its own issues.
Planes generally like to land into the wind
as this allows them to stop faster on the
runway, but at the airport, wind almost always
comes from the south meaning planes would
be landing with a tail-wind.
In order to successfully land a 737 with a
tail-wind on the length of runway offered
at St Helena, the 737 would have to be quite
light.
It wouldn’t be able to take its full capacity
of passengers or cargo.
In fact, it would have to shed so much weight
that the flights would never be commercially
profitable for Comair, even with the planned
subsidies, and so, unceremoniously, it was
announced that Comair, and therefore British
Airways, would not be running the flights
to St Helena.
Eventually, the story of St Helena Airport
reached the world.
The British tabloids got their hands on it
and ripped it to shreds.
They called the airport, “embarrassing,”
a “gaffe,” a “folly,” a “farcical
vanity project.”
Much of what was reported wasn’t even accurate.
Tabloids said it was impossible to land, they
said the airport was closed, neither of which
was true.
In fact, throughout the delay, private and
medevac flights were coming in and out with
no problem.
The media latched on to the video of that
Comair Implementation flight and, as one outlet
called it, the, “terrifying three attempts
it took to land.”
In reality, it was one planned fly-by, one
aborted landing, and one successful landing.
In the world of commercial aviation, aborted
landings are nothing exceptional.
They happen many times a day at airports large
and small all around the world.
Most of all, though, the common thread between
all the media reports was the nickname St
Helena Airport received: “the World’s
Most Useless Airport.”
That was the one that stung.
“I think a lot of those sort of initial
label given by the popular media has not helped
the island.
I think it's totally false, quite frankly.”
“We knew that it was going to get a lot
of flack over it from the media.
We didn't quite appreciate how much it was
going to feature, but it became a lot about
how bad the British government had done in
investing in this airport on St Helena and
putting it in the wrong place, essentially.”
“When the bad press hit of St Helena having
this white elephant for an airport, I was
really angry and still to today, in my professional
capacity, we are countering and battling to
get rid of that negativity.
It is really bad and people doesn't want to
see the good that is actually happening.”
“Since all of those articles, we've had
to spend a lot of time, I suppose, trying
to sell the island for its positive aspects.”
“But those things are harder to get through
than the sensationalist stuff that sells papers.”
“Well, you always have starting out problems,
and what would you expect?
We are in the middle of the South Atlantic.
This is the first time for it to happen.
So you gotta have trial and error and I wish
people would just leave the error now aside
and look at what is happening as a result."
In order to shrug off that nickname, they
needed, of course, a flight.
“ So we had to do a lot of research.
So we commissioned our UK Met office to do
a lot of research on our wind data.
So we collated a lot of wind data over six
months, twelve months so we could ascertain
exactly what the conditions were on runway
20 and 02.
Once we got all that thought into place, then
the secretary government went up with a new
tender looking for an aircraft that could
actually land runway 02, which had a 15 knot
tail wind component.”
It was runway 20 that had the wind shear issue,
not runway 02.
These two are, in fact, the same physical
runway, but runway 20 refers to the landing
coming from the north, runaway 02 refers to
the landing from the south.
The prevailing winds originate from the south,
so the key to a safe landing was an aircraft
small enough to stop safely within the length
of the runway even when wind pushes it from
behind.
That way, if the wind shear from the north
is too bad, it can land from the south.
The service was not to be subsidized, but
rather underwritten.
“There isn't a subsidy per passenger.
So SA Airlink, who fly here, they don't get
paid, let's say 10 pounds per passenger per
flight at all.
It's very much a commercial service, but if
that commercial service makes a loss, that
loss is underwritten by DFID in the UK.”
Two main bidders emerged to operate the flights
to St Helena.
The first was a company called Atlantic Star
Airlines.
Founded in 2012—still the early days of
the airport construction process—Atlantic
Star was created specifically to serve as
an airline for St Helena.
Their original plan was to make weekly flights
directly from London to St Helena via some
midway refueling stop in addition to a weekly
flight to Cape Town.
It was an ambitious plan, but they were serious
about it.
The company consisted of seasoned aviation
executives and professionals including a CEO
who came from British Airways.
Over time, though, the plan was scaled back
to operating a few charter flights a year
from London to St Helena via Banjul, in The
Gambia.
This was going to happen.
They had an agreement with TUI airlines to
charter a 737, they had announced schedules,
they had set fares, but then, of course, the
airport’s opening was delayed, and these
flights were all cancelled.
After some time, in October, 2016, Atlantic
Star came back into the story by chartering
an Avro RJ1000 to fly to the island and run
a series of test landings—a move the company
tried to use as evidence of their legitimacy
in the bidding process.
The proposal was that they would lease an
Avro jet to be based on St Helena as the island’s
dedicated aircraft.
Twice a week, they would fly the hour and
a half north to Ascension Island to connect
with the bi-weekly RAF flights to the UK.
Having the aircraft based on St Helena would,
according to their bid, be quite the benefit
for the island considering that it could,
at a moment’s notice, fly medical evacuation
flights, rather than waiting for a plane to
fly in from South Africa to pick a patient
up.
Ultimately, though, the bid failed.
The other major bid submitted to the St Helena
government was by a South African Airline
called Airlink.
Their plan was to fly an Embraer E190 jet
to St Helena once-weekly on Saturdays.
The aircraft would fly from Johannesburg to
Windhoek, Namibia, where it would meet another
service coming in from Cape Town.
This connecting structure was viewed as quite
important since, while much of the Saint diaspora
is in Cape Town, Johannesburg is the larger
airport and offers more connections.
From Windhoek, it would then fly the three
hours over the South Atlantic to land in St
Helena.
It would then do the same in reverse.
Included in Airlink’s bid was an agreement
to operate once-monthly charter flights from
St Helena to Ascension Island as an add-on
to their flight from Johannesburg, giving
that island, which primarily serves as a military
base for the UK and US, its only regularly-scheduled,
non-military flight to the outside world.
This bid was as close to perfect St Helena
was going to get.
On July 21st, 2017, the St Helena Government
signed a contract with Airlink and announced
to the world that this tiny, south-Atlantic
outpost was finally getting its connection
to the world.
St Helena was getting a flight, for real this
time.
A few months later, just over a year after
that Comair flight had arrived in the skies
above St Helena, an Airlink Embraer E190 did
the same.
It was filled with 70 or so journalists, tourists,
and Saints, and soon enough, safely touched
down and was greeted by, well, a big proportion
of St Helena.
That was St Helena’s before and after moment.
Once those wheels touched down, St Helena
would never be the same.
But once that happened, once the honeymoon
period was over, it was time for St Helena
to get to work.
Realizing the full potential of the airport
was no easy task.
Of course the natural environment presented
its own issues, but the true challenge lies
in the island’s geographic isolation and
political independence, which mean that, in
all aspects, the airport has to be entirely
self-sufficient.
They’re not run by some big company, they’re
not part of any national system.
St Helena Airport is run by St Helena Airport
Limited and, if Gwyneth Howell, its CEO, doesn’t
know what to do, there’s not really anyone
she can call.
That means that everything needed to run St
Helena Airport, from administrative to operational,
has to happen at St Helena Airport.
It turns out that, even with just one weekly
flight, that’s quite a lot.
“So, what we have, for example, is in this
room here we have what’s called CNS—so
communications, navigations, and surveillance.
So, we have two guys, one who works on the
IT side of things, one who works on the navigation
aids, and so on, and they’re really crucial
to the running of the airport, you know.
Without the communications and navigation
systems, without those IT systems in place,
we wouldn’t be able to land aircraft and
take off aircraft to the airport so that’s
extremely important.
CEO’s office—obviously we need a Chief
Executive Officer for St Helena Airport LTD—and
then there’s my office next door.
I’m kind of the CEO’s right hand person
so I will always be there to support them
but I’m also kind of separate as well as
I’m meant to be there to be the conscience
of the company.
To do the thinking, to do the questioning—why
are we doing it like that, could we do it
another way, could we do it a safer way, could
we do it a better way.
That’s a pretty important role.”
“So if we carry on this way, actually, this
is an important room to look in.
It’s the gym and it’s where our FS team
keep fit.
Being in the firefighting service, it’s
a very physical job so you need to be fit
all the time and, in fact, there are fitness
levels to be met so the gym is an important
part of that.
Hello, Bill.
Security and because I’m not security cleared
I’m not allowed to go in there even though
I’m, sort of, senior management team there
are still levels of security that some of
us can’t get in to and this is one where
I’m not permitted to go in to, and rightly
so.”
“So if you want to follow me down into the
rest of the combined building.
So, we have a training room.
There’s an awful lot of training that goes
on for staff.
We need to be accredited in many respects
so there’s a lot of training that goes on—security,
in particular, but also in firefighting as
well—so there’s our training room.
Walking on further down, we also have a maintenance
bay, as well, which I’ll briefly open the
door to and walk in.
So, the maintenance bay is where we obviously
maintain equipment.
We have a lot of equipment to maintain and
we have an on-site mechanic who does so.
So we also use it for storage as well.
So this, for example, is a tow-barless tug
which allows us to tow aircraft if we need
to and other bits of pieces like the toilet
cart and so on.
So it’s a multi-purpose bay so we use it
for storage and we use it for maintaining
our vehicles.
So, moving along, finally we come to the end,
and it’s the most important room in the
building because these are the people who
make sure we get paid.
So, here we have—good afternoon—we have
HR and finance.
Extremely important to running a small but
compact airport, but nevertheless, there’s
all the HR and the financial functions that
go with that.”
In addition to all the administrative functions,
St Helena Airport, while it might need less
of it, needs all the same things that an enormous
airport like Heathrow would need.
A striking example of this is the fire service.
“ICAO regulation basically states that every
airport has to have some sort of firefighting
category, it really depends on the movement
of the aircraft within the airfield.
That is regulation and that is what we have
to provide.”
“We are always on standby so if there’s
an aircraft emergency right now and we get
the crash alarms going, we can provide a three
minute response to the runway.”
That’s despite the fact that most days,
there isn’t a single aircraft within hundreds
of miles of the island, but nonetheless, it’s
what’s required by regulation.
In addition, even at an airport with thousands
of weekly flights, it’s not as if firefighters
are responding to fires all that often, which
means that there’s no real reason for those
airports to have more than one firefighting
crew.
The result is that an airport like St Helena,
which has one or two commercial flights a
week, needs firefighting capabilities pretty
similar to an airport like Heathrow, which
has thousands.
That’s part of what balloons the cost of
running such a small airport.
Given the isolation of the island, weather
forecasting is another crucially important
yet challenging part of what’s needed to
keep the weekly flight reliable and safe.
The UK Met Office stations meteorologists
on St Helena on more-or-less yearly rotations.
“Well, after a Saturday flight, so, I usually
have the Sunday and Monday off, so when I
come in on Tuesday that’s when I first start
looking at what the weather is going to be
like for the next flight date which is usually
the Saturday.
As we get nearer to the time I start to do
more detailed forecasts for the airline.
So, on a Friday I produce a detailed forecast
for their estimated time of arrival on Saturday
and then I come in at 4:00 on the Saturday
morning and take that forecast and forward
that to the flight operations.”
The reason this is so important is so that
they know, when an aircraft is supposed to
get to St Helena Airport, it’ll be able
to land at St Helena Airport.
“The main problem is, because of the remoteness
of the airfield, there are no nearby diversions
so they can’t arrive here and spend two
hours circling and then divert to a nearby
airport.
If they come here then they’ve got to be
99% convinced that they’re going to be able
to land, so I will be looking at, cloud base
and visibility is the main things that stop
them from landing at St Helena.
The reason being because of their restrictions
they have to be visual with the airfield before
they can land.
So if the cloud base is below 900 feet, then
they won’t be able to see the airfield before
their decision point.”
Assuming the airline has that required level
of confidence that the flight will be able
to successfully land at St Helena, Airlink
will give it clearance to depart from Johannesburg
at about 9 am local time.
It’ll then make the two hour flight to Walvis
Bay, Namibia, a more or less regular flight.
At Walvis Bay, they’ll refuel the aircraft’s
tanks, giving them about six-hours of flying
time, but also at the stop, they have to once
again decide whether they’ll be able to
land at St Helena.
This time, the level of confidence has to
be higher than it was even in Johannesburg,
but assuming they are confident, the flight
will take off, climb to altitude, and begin
its three-hour ocean crossing, but the decisions
still aren’t over.
Throughout this crossing, the airline will
be continuously evaluating the conditions
on the island to assure that they will be
able to land and, if they believe they can’t,
they’ll turn back for Namibia.
Assuming they continue on, eventually, they
will then approach the island, drop altitude,
and connect by radio with the airport’s
air traffic controller, but then, even once
there, if the cloud levels are too low or
the wind is too strong, the plane still won’t
be able to land.
“So when they get here and they’re not
able to land on the first attempt to land,
they will do a go-around, they will go into
a holding pattern, and they will wait for
a few minutes.
Based on what we have in terms of satellite
image for the weather, it could be ten minutes,
it could be five minutes, it could be as soon
as they go around, when they come back they
can see the runway, and then they’ll be
able to do a landing.”
“So, in the unlikely event that successful
landing cannot be completed, then the aircraft
will have to divert.”
St Helena’s closest diversion point is Ascension
Island.
It’s about an hour and a half flight north,
so this is likely where any flight would divert
if landing at St Helena was not possible.
There they have fuel and facilities so the
Airlink flight could give landing on St Helena
another shot the day after.
In the time that St Helena airport has been
open, no commercial flight has ever failed
landing and had to divert.
In fact, in the first 10 months of 2019, the
airport didn’t even have a single cancelled
flight.
Every Saturday, at about 1:15 pm, at Airlink
Embraer E190 has reliably pierced through
the clouds above St Helena’s airport, ready
to drop off another load of eager tourists
and wistful locals.
Saturdays at St Helena airport are an event.
Despite its tiny size, people start arriving
at the building three to four hours in advance
of the flight.
While the plane might only seat 96 people,
every flight sees a crowd far larger, as extended
families of every Saint arriving and leaving
seem to show up.
Just for the flight day, there opens a bank
branch, a gift shop, a luggage wrapping business,
a cafe, and a restaurant.
Those not taking the flight will stand in
the check-in hall, looking to see who’s
leaving, then make their way up to the restaurant
once the passengers pass through security.
Then, as the time draws near, everyone packs
into the observation deck—far busier than
that of any of the world’s largest airports—and
look to the left.
It’s reminiscent of sailors watching to
be the first to see land, but in this case,
it’s Saints trying to be the first to see
their link to the outside world—a world
that some of them have only seen through screens.
They try to spot the small metal tube that
represents the link between them and us.
With patience, the time comes and the Embraer
E190 appears in St Helena’s skies.
It makes its approach, usually jostled around
by the consistently inconsistent winds, then
passes the daunting cliff at the end of the
runway, then glides smoothly into touchdown.
That’s when the airport truly comes alive.
Only 75 minutes sits between the scheduled
landing time and the scheduled takeoff time
each Saturday so, as soon as the aircraft
takes its right turn towards the apron, there
begins a carefully choreographed dance.
The aircraft is marshaled in, then first to
approach are the airstairs, followed by the
ground power unit that gives energy to the
aircraft while it sits powered down.
While the cleaners approach the aircraft,
the baggage compartment of the aircraft is
opened, the fuel truck gets into position,
and the first passengers start to disembark.
With certain jobs only needing to happen once
a week, quite a few staff at the airport work
multiple jobs.
The firefighters, for example, go straight
from their truck, assuring that the aircraft
has landed safely, to handling baggage.
At the back of the aircraft, all the sewage
from the lavatory has to be emptied, and an
ambulift is used to lift passengers with reduced
mobility on and off.
The pilots qualified to land at St Helena
are among the most senior and experienced
at Airlink, which means there are fewer than
ten pilots who work the route.
Therefore, they visit the island on average
about once a month, but, since the aircraft
only stays there for just over an hour, have
never seen more of the island than the airport.
During their time on the island, though, they’ll
perform a safety inspection of the plane and
then, soon enough, it’ll be time to load
up.
Boarding the 96 or fewer passengers doesn’t
take long, and quickly, the door will close,
the stairs will pull away, and the aircraft
will taxi back to the runway.
It will take a turn to the north, roll its
way down to the end of the runway, turn around,
then thunder down St Helena’s spotlessly
clean piece of pavement to take off on its
four and a half hour trip back to Johannesburg.
With that, the clock starts ticking again
as the airport preps for its next 75 minutes
in the spotlight, and then everyone makes
their way to their homes or hotels, starting
their next week of isolation from the world.
Of course the Saints love the airport while
they’re at it, when they’re standing in
the observation deck watching the plane fly
off, destined for Johannesburg in a quick
four and a half hours.
For those that have lived their entire lives
on St Helena, the prospect of getting to South
Africa in a matter of hours still seems like
magic.
Once people go home, though, the question
that comes up frequently in conversation is:
was it worth it?
“2013 and 2014, when they were building
the airport, was a big, significant boom for
St Helena--the amount of people that were
in and out of the island, a lot of St Helenians
saw an airplane for the first time in their
life, the economy was actually thriving.
So it was a build up to what was the airport
going to bring for saying to Helena.”
“I would say people expected the airport
to bring quite significant change.
Now, whether that those expectations were
reasonable is something that is perhaps debatable.”
“The once a week flight is ok, but at the
end of the day, if you bring it in a plane
which can carry potentially 90 passengers,
that's not enough to be able to generate a
significant increase in the footfall on St
Helena.”
“I think there's an expectation that the
service perhaps isn't delivering what it should,
but I think we also have to take into account
the fact that we're still a relatively untested
market both for tourists and also for potential
investors.”
Looking at the graphs, the airport has had
some effect.
In the 12 months after its opening, 3,337
people arrived on the island by plane.
That’s compared to just 2,616 passengers
who had arrived the previous 12 months on
the RMS.
In the airport’s second year of operations,
4,188 passengers arrived via the airport,
which certainly is a measurable improvement,
although overall visitor arrivals to the island
stayed about the same as there was a period
of overlap between the start of flights and
the end of RMS service.
It’s tough to measure the true success of
the airport yet, just two years into service,
but what’s sure is that there has been no
tourism explosion.
Flights are expensive, infrequent, and indirect
for everyone but South Africans, and this
has kept the island a niche destination.
The island certainly had to hurry up and wait,
as, while the first flight might have been
the impetus for change, it certainly didn’t
change everything overnight.
Evacuation Flight - 2.5 minutes
Success, for St Helena Airport, however, cannot
be measured solely by visitor numbers.
It can also be measured in lives—the number
of lives this solitary piece of pavement has
saved.
“So I, uh, I was in my last trimester…
fairly normal pregnancy up until the last
bit when my blood pressure spiked.
So the concern was preeclampsia and they decided
that I needed an emergency caesarean.
So Eli was born about four weeks earlier than
than expected.
We had him around half six Wednesday evening,
and he had a bit of a restless night.
Breathing wasn't so good, although that was
to be expected because of the C-section.
The next morning the midwife came in and she
said, no, breathing wasn't normal, and they
decided to put him on the ventilator and have
him assessed.
So they did so many tests and he had respiratory
distress syndrome and about like eleven-ish
on Thursday night, Dr. Kevin O'Brian and Helen
Lawrence came in to our room to say that you
say that he would need to be Medevacd.
The RMS was on its last journey to the UK,
so our reaction was, how do we get him out?
And then we we were told that they had already
decided to get a medevac flight in.”
Two days after Eli was born, on a Friday afternoon,
a small jet from a South African medical evacuation
company touched down at St Helena Airport,
representing only the fourth arrival by a
fixed wing aircraft to the island.
The team spent the afternoon evaluating Eli’s
condition, and then early the following morning,
him and his mother, Patrice, were transferred
by ambulance to the airport and brought onto
the jet.
After a quick four hours crossing the South
Atlantic, they touched down in Cape Town,
and by 2pm local time arrived at Vincent Pallotti
Hospital, with all the facilities Eli needed,
just about five hours after leaving the hospital
in St Helena.
“If it wasn't for the airport then I really
doubt that Eli would have made it.
It would have been a long wait for the RMS
to come down, like another month, and then
the week’s travel to Cape Town.
He probably wouldn't have made it.
Waiting for the month for the ship to actually
get there.
So no, without the airport, I don't think
Eli would have survived.”
Today, Eli is a perfectly healthy young boy.
He’s one of the handful of Saints who quite
directly owe their lives to the airport.
Isolation is dangerous, and St Helena’s
hospital just isn’t equipped to handle advanced
medical conditions.
Before the airport, that medical risk just
came with the territory and in some cases,
survival was down to luck—the luck of where
the RMS was on its voyage schedule.
One can’t easily argue against anything
that saves lives, no matter the cost, but
the truth is that, when the British government
spent their hundreds of millions of dollars
to build St Helena Airport, they had more
than the humanitarian benefits in mind.
In the two years since its opening, the airport
has brought change, but it has not yet fundamentally
transformed what St Helena is.“I think that
the potential for the island is actually really,
really quite strong, but I think, as with
all emerging destinations, it's going to take
a while.
What I think is worrying, though, is that
for a lot of people, it's how long will that
while be?
Is it going to be five years, 10 years, 20
years?
Nobody really knows.”
Long-term, the airport’s ambition is, of
course, to grow the island’s economy.
The UK’s Department for International Development
conducted a business case for the airport
way back in 2010, and developed a tourism
growth estimate for St Helena based on how
other similar islands fared in the industry
after improving their access.
This model, starting at about 1,000 tourists
per year in 2016, projected growth to 30,000
yearly tourists by 2042—a number that has
been subject to intense scrutiny everywhere
from the Saint Helena dinner table to the
Parliament of the United Kingdom.
The data show, though, that accounting for
the one-year delay in the airport’s opening,
current visitor arrivals are exactly on target
for this growth.
What that means is that the airport project
is not doomed from the start.
What will determine its success is what’s
to come, and the Christmas 2019 season is
bringing something promising—sold-out flights.
The holidays are by far the most popular season
for travel to St Helena and with that, in
the months of December, January, and February,
Airlink has added Tuesday flights from Cape
Town—a first for the island.
In addition, there’s another promising sign:
in their first year of operation, the flights
actually turned a small profit for Airlink.
Longer term, the island has ambitions for
an even more extensive network of flights.
One goal would be to get a route to a South
American city like Recife to allow for a more
direct route from the Americas.
Technically, this would be plenty feasible
as it’s only a four-hour flight.
Commercially, though, that’s another question.
Also on the wishlist is a roundtrip flight
to Namibia to tap into their large tourism
market.
However, the largest tourist demographic for
the island by far is British, and so the crown
jewel of routes would be to the UK.
Since before the airport even opened there’s
been talk of a route to London via Cape Verde.
Right now, though, these are all just dreams.
An airline would only take the enormous risk
of starting a route to St Helena if it proved
not only commercially viable, but successful.
That has not happened yet.
The next couple years for St Helena are crucial.
As the number of successfully completed flights
ticks up, data will prove whether they’re
sticking to this line—the line that will
determine whether St Helena will survive economically
into the far future.
If they stick to it, they’re in for an economic
renaissance.
If they start to fall below it, there’s
little hope for any sort of self-sufficiency,
meaning the island will remain at the mercy
of the UK’s budgetary allocations.
St Helena was never supposed to change overnight
and the airport was never supposed to be a
magic cure-all.
The airport is a tool for change, not the
impetus of change itself.
For the island to fundamentally change, it
has to sell itself to the world.
It has to one-by-one convince people to come
to it, to invest in it, to take a risk on
a place that’s competing with an entire
world of options.
Time has proven that St Helena airport is
not, “the World’s Most Useless Airport.”
It has rather proven that it has the potential
to become the world’s most useful airport.
An airport that could save lives, revitalize
an economy, and connect a forgotten dot on
the map to the rest of it.
An airport that could rescue an island from
falling into the same fate of so many like
it—crumbling into irrelevance as its people
are slowly drawn to the urban world—so now
that the island has their tool, all they have
to do is use it.
As I mentioned at the start, this entire project
was made possible thanks to Curiosity Stream.
They covered all the enormous production expenses
including flying a team to St Helena and all
they asked in return was for us to mention
the bundle deal they’re running with Nebula—the
streaming site founded by myself and loads
of other great creators and where this documentary
originally released.
If you sign up for any Curiosity Stream subscription
at CuriosityStream.com/Wendover, you’ll
not only get access to thousands of top-quality
documentaries and TV shows on there, you’ll
also get a subscription to Nebula at no added
cost.
On Nebula, you’ll find tons of great original
content like this one from loads of the internet’s
best creators.
I can safely say this is the best value in
the streaming world, so, head over to CuriosityStream.com/Wendover
to sign up for the bundle deal, and while
you’re at it, you’ll also be helping support
independent creators create great, ambitious
projects just like this.
