Originally Posted by
interpreter
There is a rumour that a twin engined jet took off as cleared using the northern runway recently at Gatwick and only just cleared hardware at the eastern end. Does anybody know anything about this?
A "twin-engined jet" at Gatwick doesn't narrow it down much.
As for "hardware at the eastern end" of the northern runway, it's hard to see what that could have been. You could roll for another kilometer beyond the end of the 08L TORA and unless you were unlucky enough to encounter a taxying aircraft, the first thing you would hit would be the jetties on stands 4/5.
If you really do mean that a departing aircraft only just cleared one on the ground, I think we would have heard about it by now without waiting for an AAIB report.