This runway is built on stilts and British Airways only has 20 pilots cleared to land there

The thrill of watching planes land in incredibly challenging places never gets old: there's this one between cliffs in Peru, this one that shuts down Gibraltar's main road, and the wind-whipped runway at Birmingham. There's also Funchal, an airport on the Portuguese island of Madeira, that is actually so treacherous that pilots must be specifically certified to fly there. In fact, British Airways just started to serve the destination and now only has 20 pilots on payroll that can actually legally land aircraft there.

What makes this airport so special is that it hugs a cliff line that plunges into the sea, with the airport nestled right beneath these mammoth cliffs. Over the years, since opening in 1964, the airport's two runways were also elongated — twice — to both accommodate larger planes and increase safety. The second time was in 2000, when the airport had to nearly double the size of the original runway.

Landfill wasn't an option and there was no way to reposition the runway for a longer run — so the airport decided to...wait for it...build it on stilts!

Spread across 70 pillars. the extension even earned the contractors, based out of Brazilian, an international award known as the Oscars of structural engineering (now there's a ceremony that sounds exciting). British Airways took the chance to showcase its latest destination with a video that highlights the harrowing experience of piloting into Funchal — it's quite the location for a runway.