Please prove I'm not Gullible!!!

[LissafromSJ]

Okay Joel110 - I was amazed at the shot of the beach bar photo in your Eastern excursion advice response (the one with the airplane landing right over the beach) and I showed my husband and he laughed. He says I'm too gullible because there's no way that's a real photo. Hmm. I've looked at it again and again and I think he's wrong.
Since there's a bet riding on this, can someone help me convince him that's a real photo (in case no one saw it, go back a few pages to the thread about the Eastern excursions and look for Joel110's response). Thanks!! Melissa

 

[Mumph39]

http://www.sunsetbeachbar.com/Members/SBB_Staff/phot_1107291717/sbaf340.jpg/photo_view?display=large

That is the link to the picture.

 

[faireygod mother]

It is real and true. We were there in November and watched it ourselves.

 

[232271]

Is that the landing strip just on the right over the fence?
Do the planes fly that low all the time?

 

[ennisb]

It is true, in fact there is a story of how a Jumbo jet waiting to take off blew a car on it's side during the engine rev up just before the planes breaks are released.

Cool pictures

 

[Joel110]

I have an awesome video if I can figure out how to upload it. But I can't take credit for the pictures on the Sunset Beach Bar website, as it is the actual website for the Sunset Beach Bar where the planes fly over. They have their guests send them in. Their e-mail/address info is on that site so you can get more info for your husband if you want, but they're 100% real. This bar is at the end of the landing strip on the beach and people sit there drink beer, sun on the beach and watch the planes. They broadcast the air traffic control so you can hear the pilots talking and post the scheduled flights for the day. It's really cool.

There are 100's of photos on the website, but they also post photos of some of the topless women that show up at the bar. I didn't want anyone to be scared to visit because by looking at the website, you'd think there were topless women all over. It's St. Maartan and you run the chance of seeing a topless woman anywhere on the island, but we were there 4 hours, saw only one topless woman about 200 yards down the beach. We had 6 kids under the age of 6 with us and never were uncomfortable. I think's it's just around spring break and late evening parties that get carried away. Here's the link to some other photo albums, but again you may catch a picture of a topless woman. http://www.sunsetbeachbar.com/photoalbums

Again, the other warning is that there's a drawbridge going back into Phillipsburg that goes up everyday at 5:30pm. Unless you have a cabbie driving you, I can't stress how important it is that you need to beat the 5:30pm drawbridge or you could miss the Disney boat. We got held up by the drawbridge and, luckily, a friend of mine who lives on the island knew how to get us back to the ship, but we walked up the plank at 6:50pm and "all aboard" was 7:00pm. My dad was freaking out, banging the steering wheel. The big planes land between 2 and 3, then leave around 4pm, but there are island hoppers and smaller 757/737 size planes coming in during the day too. My BILs had to stay until the KLM 747 took off and it was running late, so that's why we nearly missed the ship. I'll try and see if I can upload some video.

 

[Joel110]

For reference, here's the St. Maarten island map: http://www.caribbean-on-line.com/sm/smmap.shtml

The beach bar is basically at Maho Bay on the west side of Queen Juliana Airport close to the number "13". Right by the number "23" is where the drawbridge is between Simpson Bay and Simpson Bay Lagoon. The Disney Magic ports in Great Bay by Phillipsburg near where it says "Bobby's Marina". It looks to be a whole 5 miles, but including waiting on the drawbridge and traffic, it took us 1 hour and 40 minutes to get back, drop rental cars off and board the ship.

I'd do it again.

 

[bdcp]

I checked Snopes.com and there is nothing there about the photo, and they have info on every urban legend, photo, etc circulating on the web. It's apparently real, but the perspective makes it look lower than it probably is. How often do planes go over?

I check snopes all the time because people are gullible and believe just about anything they read or see posted on the internet or sent by a "friend of a friend". A lot of photos are actually two photoshopped together.

 

[Timon]

The photo is very real! Actually, the photo with the KLM 747 is what made us want to go visit that beach! We love planes! So on our cruise we rented a car and spent a few hours at the Sunset Beach Bar. We waited until 4 pm or so for the Air France 747 that was scheduled to come in but it was late and we had to head back to the ship but we did see other smaller planes and trust me, it's real!
Here's a photo I took

 

[logan1_2000]

Yes, it is real, Queen Juliana airport is right as it looks, next to the beach, and there are all sorts of landing and take off stories and they are all real. DW and I spent a week on St. Martin 5 years ago (wow, where does the time go?) and have been back to the island twice now on cruises and will visit again in April on the Magic. The traffic is as aggravating as the other posters warn, so I dont go to Maho Beach, I am happy to hand easily at Great Bay Beach, w/i sight of the ship and near the water taxi.

The runway is also minimal length for the big jets, so when you land they slam on the brakes and then use up every foot of runway anyway, and then have to back up because there is not enough room to turn. We landed in a 757.

 

[Joel110]

OK Melissa. What was the bet? I hope you got a Cabana Massage out of it!

 

[DBBN]

As others have already pointed out...it is real. Many other similar photographs can be viewed at airliners.net. Here is the link.

 

[chasbos]

Yes, very real - hope you had something big riding on this! The Air France and other 747's were our afternoon entertainment last year while staying at the Maho - the kids loved it. The only time it was a nuisance was right in the middle of DB wedding vows! We were on the white covered gazebo just under the last pictures front landing gear - did not hear much of what the minister was saying during that landing.

The landings are fun to watch but the take offs were amazing. The planes taxi out towards you and then do a big turn to be facing the runway and then look out - they pretty much do a brake torque! They rev the engines up to full speed (the runway is not real long and the hills are at the end of them) and everything behind them gets blown away (unsuspecting people topple over, there towels and hats end up in the sea )

After they are at full speed they shoot down the runway and then they go straight up and I mean straight up and then make a hard right turn! I basicly sat there all week thinking OMG I have to do that on Saturday (the day we left) I was fully prepared though and when you are plastered to the back of your seat during takeoff you just remember how many successful takeoffs you watched all week!

 

[LissafromSJ]

Looks like someone is getting a nice dinner out of this! As soon as my hubby comes home, I'm gonna show him these responses. Poor thing, I'm sure he's going to want to check out the link to the St. Maartin beach and shield his eyes so he doesn't "accidentally" see a topless woman. The price he'll have to pay for not believing me I guess ...
Hopefully I'll lose my reputation around here for being the gullible one!
Thank you all for responding! Melissa

 

[Tigger&Belle]

I checked Snopes.com and there is nothing there about the photo, and they have info on every urban legend, photo, etc circulating on the web. It's apparently real, but the perspective makes it look lower than it probably is. How often do planes go over?

As soon as I saw the picture I also checked snopes. lol It's funny to get serious e-mails from people and those people are so surprised after I send the snopes link disproving what they believed to be true.

The airplane pictures are amazing!

T&B

 

[Tigger&Belle]

Hopefully I'll lose my reputation around here for being the gullible one!
Thank you all for responding! Melissa

Did you hear that they took the word "gullible" out of the dictionary?

T&B

 

[TheWog]

You can show him the video. Another thread has actual video footage of the landing.

 

[randytenn]

And, just to head off the "someone photoshopped a whole bunch of photos" arguement, here is a video clip of a jumbo jet getting ready to take off, and the resultant wind behind it, making people run for the water.

http://www.dataflo.net/~mpurintun/videos/beach_breeze.wmv

Cool place!