Originally Posted by
JayMatlock
My opinion remains that a runway IS clearly distinguishable from a taxiway at night.
The DAL521 pilots who arrived just prior said they found it visually confusing and could have made the same mistake if they were not using lateral guidance. I think you are missing the well made point in the report on the role of expectation bias and confirmation bias. One important point made in the report is the lights from the planes lined up on the taxiway may have given a false impression of runway lighting. Fortunately there was some kind of pattern recognition process going on in their minds and it was that which resulted in narrowly avoiding what may have become the worst ever aircraft collision.
Your opinion is a bit moot actually because these competent pilots did not clearly distinguish the taxiway from the runway. The visual clues were not strong enough and the poor implementation and existing deficiencies of a number of safety barriers led to the incident.
It's a very informative case of human factors and multiple root causes.