The Airchive- Hong Kong Kai Tak 2000 Planespotting

	Kai Tak Aerial Seen during its heyday, this aerial of Kai-Tak captures the busy traffic and congestion of the world’s 3rd busiest international airport and busiest single runway airport. Photo courtesy of locally based photographer Daryl Chapman. See more of his celebrated work at jetphotos.net.
	Club Kai Tak Interiors At the time of my visit in December 1999, the 1962 was being converted into what else? A bowling alley and night club! The baggage hall was to become a mall, the control tower a bar!
	Kai Tak from Lion’s Rock Here, Kai Tak is viewed from Lion’s Rock. Kai Tak’s ramp and runway were being converted to valuable business and residential real estate in the heart of dense Kowloon. Note the runway and ramp are in advance stages of removal. The last commercial flight out was a Dragon Air departure. These images were taken in December 1999, a year and a half after Kai Tak was closed on July 5, 1998.
	Checkerboard The famous Checkerboard on Lion’s Rock which signaled the 47 degree turn and final 3,000 feet run to the threshold of Runway 13. In the pre-1998 days, this was a haven for plane spotters.
	Kai Tak Scale Model What a find! My friend Oscar Garcia, a Cathay 777 pilot, and myself found this amazingly detailed model of Kai Tak at an air enthusiasts store near Kai Tak.A similarly detailed model exists at Hamburg, Germany of it’s airport.


	Wind back the clocks to 1996 when Kai Tak was the world's busiest single runway airport.