Today, I got a behind the scenes tour of KMSP (Minneapolis/Saint Paul International Airport), including ramp access! This is thanks our good friend and neighbor who knows Mark (the guy in charge of field operations a MSP), and was able to set up a tour!
We met in at the core of MSP’s operations, their Field Operations & Maintenance HQ. The office looks like any other sort of office, and we joined the other two members of our group (both NWS meteorologists) in a rather unassuming conference room. We chatted for a bit, then piled into a Field Maintenance vehicle.
After entering the “secure” zone through a heavily guarded access gate, we drove passed Fire Station 1. Each of MSP’s 11 fire trucks costs anywhere from $800,000 to $1.2 million, quite a price tag for something you hope never needs to be used.
Apart from the foam sprayers, each station has a truck called the “Striker,” which can pierce the fuselage of an airplane with a huge spike basically, to spray fire retardant inside.
We then entered one of MSP’s large de ice pads. They have a state of the art run off system, to the de ice fluid sprayed on the aircraft is collected, processed, and turned into washer fluid for cars!
A few hundred yards beyond the fire station sits the retired Delta Air Lines MD-80, which the fire department uses to practice on. The reason its stained yellow? The de-ice team uses it to practice their skills using dyed water.
I’ve never been so close to fully extended flaps!
This may look like one of MSP’s many unassuming grassy areas (as viewed from a taxiway), but in January, a Delta Air Lines Airbus A320 skidded off an icy taxiway onto this very section of grass after landing from Cabo San Lucas (News Article).
We then got to talking about MSP’s emergency preparations. Some of it Mark couldn’t tell me (for security reasons), but the things they train for are wild. One of the things they practice (in cooperation with Sun Country) is containing a biological threat on a plane. The thing they use is Anthrax (obviously they don’t bring in a real patient). If a plane were to come in with a potentially exposed or infected with something like Anthrax (or more likely something more like Ebola), there is apparently a 57 page document detailing exactly how and where people would be contained, etc.
The plan was only implemented once, Mark said, when a passenger potentially exposed to H1N1 (Swine Flu) landed at MSP in 2009.
This also brought up the topic of Air Force One. Again, there were things he couldn’t disclose, but he is one of the main people who coordinates with the Secret Service and president’s team to make a safe and smooth arrival into MSP.
We then headed over the MSP’s large FBO area, where a United 737 sat seemingly without a baggage door? Does anyone know what this is all about?
After getting clearance to cross a runway, we made our way to the sprawling T1, where we got a brief glimpse into the massive baggage handling operation, one of the most modern in the US. Minneapolis, being a major hub for connections, has made it a priority to streamline the bag transfer process, especially between carriers (IE: Delta to KLM).
As we entered runway 4/22, I spotted one of the shortest flights from MSP, over to Eau Claire, Wisconsin with Sun Country Airlines, at a total air time of 22 minutes.
For the first time ever, I stepped onto a runway. 4/22 is MSP’s longest, at almost 12,000 feet in length. It’s rarely used however.
To finish out our tour, we stopped by the massive storage lot for MSP’s fleet of snow removal vehicles. Just rows and rows of massive trucks of all kinds sitting dormant, waiting for winter.
