I was surfing the internet when I came across one of the many famous images of airplanes flying insanely close to the water for the final approach at St. Maarten airport. Looking to this photos I thought to myself, there is maybe a possibility to somehow combine underwater photography with huge jets in flight.

I really didn’t know how possible this could be as I had no personal knowledge of the area and, as asking anyone could open the possibility of having my idea stolen, I had to keep with it a secret. In the meantime, I pitched the idea to Boeing and KLM, who were keen to get involved in this crazy and untested idea even if though the outcomes were far from certain.

Eventually, I arrived with my model Ane, at St. Maarten, still very nervous about what we might find. I had done some prior research and discovered that the Maho Beach, where the runway is located, is considered the worse beach in the world just because of the noise created by the jets landing and taking off.

While I was checking-in at the hotel, an airline pilot was doing the same. I asked him, “Captain, in the next week, if you see a crazy diver in the water taking pictures, please send a “bye bye” from your flight deck window”. He thought I was joking or maybe just mad!

Day 1, we went to the beach and I rapidly discovered that capturing the image was going to be a challenge. We needed to have three variables working together, the weather, the waves’ height and direction and lastly, the model and jet being in the correct positions relative to each other.

Technically, it was a challenge to get a fast enough shutter speed to freeze a jet moving at 180 knots and maintain a small enough aperture to ensure the depth of field needs to get both plane and model in focus.

I knew how I wanted the images to look and it took me about three days to figure out exactly where I needed to be in order to capture them. I created a precise map using rocks in the water and the sand of the beach as reference points for each image but it took many failed attempts to do so. Our main subject was the Monday, Friday and Sunday KLM Boeing 747 as this was featured in the famous topside shot. This further limited and created pressure to capture my image.

It took us many frustrating days and many unexpected and frustrating trials. The arriving schedule proved variable as flights were delayed or cancelled. We had to stay in the water all day, getting cold and sunburnt.

I can attest that even after working with blue whales, Nile crocodiles, great white sharks (out of the cage) and Narwhal at the North Pole, the “swimming with jets” essay was the hardest assignment of my career. Both Ane and I at times thought that we might not succeed. It was like mining for gold, taking tons and tons of earth to find a very few nuggets of gold. The only consolation was the amusement it caused for other people on the beach. I have friends that are both divers and pilots and they express surprise that we were able to pull it off, given the speed with which they approach the runway. Both Ane and I will never look at a plane the same way and leaving St. Maarten on one was very strange!