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JapH KK 183/1
Flag A
HONG KONG: THE WALLED CITY AND AIRCRAFT SAFETY
1.
1
Mr Peter Hutton, from the Civil Aviation Authorities Operational Services Overseas, called in to see me and Miss Watson MED on 25 January to discuss aircraft safety at Kai Tak airport. He made a number of interesting points: that the airport's safety record was very good indeed-(its only blot concerns an aircraft whose pilot aborted a take off too late and which in consequence ran off the run-way and into the sea); but this was in part because the land approach was so difficult that pilots took a special care; but there was no question of Hong Kong infringing the relevant ICAO Convention since the latter made recommendations rather than rules and all Hong Kong was required to do was to register its infringements, and this had been done.
2. All in all Mr Hutton took a far more relaxed view of the
However matter than I had anticipated and I find this welcome. his attitude seemed out of tune with that I found in Hong Kong. Mr Hutton thought that there was no problem: some at least of the Hong Kong Government officials to whom I spoke (Mr Bridge, Mr Donald and Mr Tse) recognised there was indeed a problem, and a worrying one, but one on which the Chinese dimension prevented action. (I might add that because, in their view, the Chinese dimension to the situation at Kai Tak was so strong, any arguments as to the political repercussions in the UK and Hong Kong consequent upon an accident or a near accident at the airport seemed to them ill-founded. To over sympathise, even in the face of disaster or near-disaster over the Walled City, the British and Hong Kong public would, in their view, recognise clearly that the situation which led to it was immutable and that hindsight could not have helped. I disagreed that this would be their view: it is certainly not mine.
"simplify
3. Para. 2 of Page 1 (now attached for copy addressees) of a Security Branch paper put up to the Governor of Hong Kong's Securities Committee last year also serves to contradict
Mr Hutton's view. On re-reading it, however, in the light of my discussion with Mr Hutton, I gained the impression that the Hong Kong Government is indeed not contravening an ICAO Convention, but rather one of its own internal ordinances, the Airport (Control of Obstructions) Ordinance. This is bad enough, but not, I suppose, as bad as if Hong Kong was in contravention of an international convention.
There is a
4. In all I begin to feel slightly out of my depth. lot here which is either technical or legal or both and which is
But I remain of the known neither to the CAA nor this Department. view that the Hong Kong Government is tolerating the continuance
CODE 18 - 77
/of