Originally Posted by
eckhard
Maybe the ILS and approach lights for 28L were OTS. The AC crew saw the lights for 28R, mistook them for 28L and then approached the illuminated strip (TWY C) to the right of 28R, thinking that was 28R?
Similar thing happened at Gatwick in the late 80s(?). A BIA BAC1-11 actually landed on TWY J instead of RW08L. RW08R was closed but the crew saw the bright approach lights for 08L, assumed they were still on for the closed runway and mistook the dim taxiway lighting for RW08L. There was another aircraft taxiing out for departure at the far end but he/she made a rapid exit when they saw the 1-11 flaring for landing right ahead of them!
The tyre marks were visible on the taxiway for months afterwards.
Almost certainly this was the scenario. A visual approach cleared to land on 28R and ahead are two lit strips the left one must be 28L so the right hand one is 28R got manky lighting on it though... and are those lights work in progress on the runway? Ask tower to confirm cleared for 28R
See this incident at Gatwick :
"(i) Runway 26R was clearly visible throughout the approach but the pilots looked for and selected a pattern of lights to the right of it because they assumed erroneously that 26R was in fact 26L and they knew that the designated runway had to be to the right of this. "
https://aviation-safety.net/wikibase/wiki.php?id=147090
It seems that there is a recurrent human factors problem when a clearance is to parallel runways the crew will attempt to identify both (all) runways and therefore which one to land on. If the airport for whatever reason has lights off or dimmed on the other runway but visible brighter lighting on the parallel taxiway then crews who do not fly regularly to that airport may become confused.
Unfortunately, this has become more apparent with LED lighting where blue and green lights can appear white at a distance at high brilliance. (As in the case of a Delta 767 at ATL).
It is easy to dismiss these errors as inattention or stupidity but faced with what is effectively an optical illusion many crews have made mistakes. It is still happening so perhaps more needs to be done. From a report 10 years ago:
"As of August 23, 2007, 267 such events have occurred at 110 airports in the United States."
From:
http://www.airtech.tc.faa.gov/safety...ds/TN07-54.pdf
DOT/FAA/AR-TN07/54
IDENTIFICATION TECHNIQUES TO REDUCE CONFUSION BETWEEN TAXIWAYS AND ADJACENT RUNWAYS