17th
Kingsford Smith International Airport
My work at Botany Bay has included numerous visits to Sydney Airport, formally known as Kingsford Smith International Airport, and to many Sydneysiders as Mascot. The airport is the busiest in Australia, handling in excess of 30 million passengers in 2006. Jutting into Botany Bay are two runways, easily visible from satellite images, which have transformed the hydrology of the bay.
In this image a 747 taxis along runway 34L, visually merging with the towering cranes of Port Botany. A stone groin protects the runway margin from erosion by the forces of the bay, but also redirects the wave energy of the system, eroding sand from some shores and building deposits on others. The effects are evident on Towra Point’s shoreline and in the remaining underwater grass communities of the bay. The mudflats, seagrass beds and mangroves of Botany Bay are the nurseries of a complex web of life. Sport fisheries are wholly reliant on this habitat; commercial fishing in the bay has been closed for years. Some areas of the bay, such as the Penrhyn Estuary, are so polluted that recreational swimming and fishing are strictly prohibited.
An airport “zone of exclusion” is marked by a line of yellow buoys, warning away boating traffic from the secure zone of the jutting 34L and 34R runways.
Two major rivers enter Botany Bay: Georges River in the southwest and Cooks River in the northwest. The Cooks River, has been channeled to make an artificial exit into the bay, about 1.5 km to the south of the original outflow. An eyewitness recalled that the new mouth for the river was formed by bulldozers from the Commonwealth Public Works Department in August of 1950.
The old control terminal marks one of the banks of the turned river, and a small park and beach near the structure provides an ideal location for plane spotters. On many afternoons I have joined a clutch of men (women don’t seem attracted to this pursuit) at the perimeter fence to runway 34L.
Here, ardent pursuers of aviation excitement endure blast of J4 exhausts to snap digital photos or listen in on portable RF scanners. I am similarly equipped, perched at the fence with my DAT recorder, a home-brew stereo microphone, a parabloic reflector, RF scanner, and digital cam. In this milieu, I do not stand-out, possibly for the first time, as I research the bay.
Scanner set-up, with a crib sheet of radio frequencies common to the airport.
The observer’s beach is strewn with the flotsam of the bay. Common objects are plastic based consumables, such as bottles and bags, Styrofoam packing materials, and on… but on some days I’ve seen the shore strewn with dozens of rose buds, the carcases of two snowy white chickens (with and without heads), children’s wading pools, and countless beach thongs.
An errant baby bottle, energy drink, takeaway container and lime green soft drink (unconsumed).
A flotsam assemblage. This artwork was created in the scrub of the dune margin, from cast away plastic toys, stuffed animals and a coconut. Artist, unknown.
