The Ghost Runway
a documentary
The Ghost Runway
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A forgotten airfield.
On the edge of the Blue Mountains sits Katoomba Airfield, YKAT. For decades it was a training ground, an emergency access point, a gathering place for aviators and bushfire support. After the death of long-time instructor Rod Hay in 2016, the strip fell silent, leaving its future uncertain.
A drug smuggler's wreck.
Today, the most striking reminder of the airfield’s decline is a derelict Helio H250, missing its engine and scarred by graffiti. Registered to Bernard Hamilton Alexander, a pilot later convicted of attempting to smuggle more than 50 kilograms of methamphetamine into Australia from Papua New Guinea. The wreck, abandoned at Katoomba Airfield, has become a haunting symbol, linking a place once associated with training and community aviation to the shadow of international crime.
A poisoned
water catchment.
The airstrip lies within a vital water catchment, now revealed to be contaminated with toxic PFAS chemicals. Fuel tanker crashes along the nearby highway in the 1990s left a lasting legacy, as banned firefighting foams used to quell the infernos leached their toxins into the environment.
A community divided.
The plane’s presence has added fuel to long-standing disputes about the airfield’s purpose. Supporters argue the strip could still serve as a valuable emergency landing site for firefighting and medical evacuation, while critics see the derelict wreck as evidence of neglect and an argument for closing the site permanently to protect the surrounding World Heritage wilderness. The story of Katoomba Airfield is not just about who flies above the land, but who has the right to the land itself.
The future for YKAT.
Used informally by the military since the 1920s, YKAT opened officially in 1969 with local fanfare. Its lease expired in 2020, after years of competing proposals and heated debate. Deerubbin Local Aboriginal Land Council lodged a claim for the land under the Aboriginal Land Rights Act in 2019. Katoomba Airfield remains caught between history, heritage, and the shadow of a drug smuggler’s abandoned aircraft.
