Qualla: Cachimbo Airport https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:08 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_m/6/y/2/f/cachimbo-airport-wp/hero-small.webp Qualla: Cachimbo Airport https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport Cachimbo Airport: Introduction https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport/ Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. When the Brazilian military planned Cachimbo, the Amazon was in the way. Pilots flying between the northern cities and Rio de Janeiro or Sao Paulo had to follow the long coastal route, because the rainforest offered no emergency field if an engine failed over the green. So on September 3, 1950, the Brazilian Air Force opened an airstrip at Serra do Cachimbo in the southern Para, a strategic refueling point where there had been nothing before. The airstrip sits today inside a military complex of 21,588 square kilometers - larger than the state of Sergipe, nearly the size of Israel. Most of it you cannot enter. Most of what has happened here, you will never see described in detail.

Read more: Cachimbo Airport on Qualla

Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain

]]> Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/y/2/f/cachimbo-airport-wp/6y2f-cachimbo-airport-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Cachimbo Airport: A Safety Net Across the Forest https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport/ Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. The problem the planners solved in 1950 was simple. The direct great-circle route between Sao Paulo and Manaus runs through nothing - or, rather, through some of the densest and most uninterrupted rainforest on the continent. Before Cachimbo opened, there was no middle waypoint. ...

Read more: Cachimbo Airport on Qualla

Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain

]]> Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/y/2/f/cachimbo-airport-wp/6y2f-cachimbo-airport-a-safety-net-across-the-forest.mp3 0:06 2 full Cachimbo Airport: The Complex Grows https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport/ Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. In the 1970s, the Brazilian military looked at Cachimbo and saw not just a refueling stop but a piece of ground large enough and remote enough for weapons work. On March 7, 1983, the Campo de Testes do Cachimbo was created, subordinated to the Brazilian General Command for Aerosp...

Read more: Cachimbo Airport on Qualla

Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain

]]> Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/y/2/f/cachimbo-airport-wp/6y2f-cachimbo-airport-the-complex-grows.mp3 0:06 3 full Cachimbo Airport: What the Runway Can Hold https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport/ Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. The apron handles up to twenty small aircraft with full support and maintenance facilities - a scale suited to the testing complex it serves rather than to passenger traffic. No military units are permanently based here. No scheduled flights operate from the field. Cachimbo is a ...

Read more: Cachimbo Airport on Qualla

Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain

]]> Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/y/2/f/cachimbo-airport-wp/6y2f-cachimbo-airport-what-the-runway-can-hold.mp3 0:06 4 full Cachimbo Airport: The Day a 737 Fell https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport/ Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. On September 29, 2006, Cachimbo became the emergency field it was designed to be. A brand-new Embraer Legacy 600 executive jet, flown by two American pilots who were ferrying it to its Florida-based owner, struck a Gol Transportes Aereos Boeing 737-800 in level flight at 37,000 f...

Read more: Cachimbo Airport on Qualla

Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain

]]> Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/y/2/f/cachimbo-airport-wp/6y2f-cachimbo-airport-the-day-a-737-fell.mp3 0:06 5 full Cachimbo Airport: The Road That Is Not Here https://qualla.com/cachimbo-airport/ Photo credit Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk), Public domain. Cachimbo Airport is about fifteen kilometers from BR-163, the federal highway that runs from Cuiaba in Mato Grosso north to Santarem on the Amazon River. The highway matters less to the airport than the absence of other access matters. BR-163 brings soybean trucks from the Cerrad...

Read more: Cachimbo Airport on Qualla

Image: Turkmenistan.airlines.frontview.arp.jpg: elfuser derivative work: Elfuser (talk) | Public domain

]]> Thu, 16 Apr 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/6/y/2/f/cachimbo-airport-wp/6y2f-cachimbo-airport-the-road-that-is-not-here.mp3 0:06 6 full