Originally Posted by
zerograv
You bet !!! Second phase of the Hajj is extremely wild ...
There is no telling how much the aircraft weighs. The Pax bring water (zamzam water), sand, rocks, etc, etc.
Had a departure from Jeddah on a B763 with 300 Pax + Fuel to make it all the way to Mauritania. Saw the 76 climbing at 400 feet per min. Had never seen that before ... and it was not because it was very hot. This was in December, at the end of the day, at sunset.
Good thing that aircrafts are build with some good safety margins ...
In the old days we took the zamzam water off the pax in Jeddah, empty them, then the bottles were refilled at KUL on arrival. I have to say the Malaysian pax were great. Nigerian pax were the equivalent of a Friday night Ibiza (that's not even a decent comparison) and most decent carriers didn't go near them..