Two Dogs this picture turned up a year or so back doing the rounds...none of us ex PNG pilots recognise the strip and it's either Irian Jaya or South America...it's very likely a MAF 206 judging by the colour scheme....and my guess is Irian Jaya.
I suspect there is a LITTLE bit of lense induced distortion but that is most obvious around the little flat bit half way down....I don't think that is as flat as it looks....in fact it looks almost un-negotiable without a prop or tail srike
REALLY steep strips are however common...15-20% slopes are very common in PNG and Irian Jaya...there are strips in Irian Jaya that would not be allowed in PNG, and in PNG we always had a pretty broad mind about what constituted possible.
Another common feature in PNG and Irian Jaya is landing around corners...20 odd degree heading change in 400 m...and sometimes a combination of both steep and around corners
The technique for steep airstrips revolved around carrying enough extra speed into the roundout/flare to get the nose up high enough to 'land normally' and then apply LOTS of power as the wheels touched to get up to the parking bay...if the aircraft stopped before the top it may well be impossibe to get there at all...especially with a full load in the back.
It is also essential to 'look high' all the way down final approach into a steep strip...if it starts looking 'normal' you are below the strip and will land in the trees short of the strip...more than one new pilot has done this. In essence you are making a normal 3 degree approach, slightly fast and thus you look incredibly high on approach. There were also strips where the touchdown zone was a 3-5% downslope before a 12-15% upslope on the last 2/3rds of the strip...then you must look low all the way. 3-5% cross slopes were not unusual too...in fact combinations of ALL the above characteristics were not uncommon at one airstrip...they were the really challenging ones.
It should not be underestimated just how much fun this is...when I was doing this for a living NOTHING else came close for pure fun and pleasure..I would rather do this than have sex...by a rather large margin
Mix in rain (most afternoons or early mornings) or strong tailwinds which were the norm from just before midday on sunny days (anabatic winds), windsheer from elevated thresholds (sometimes you went from 2000'AGL to touchdown in a few seconds) and you can see why boredom was never an issue...unlike these days doing longhaul
