Originally Posted by
43Inches
The QF excursion at Bangkok was pure luck that there was no fire and no loss of life for exactly the same brain fart that led to an experienced crew taking off on the wrong runway in a typhoon. QF 1 was just an experienced crew screwing up a landing in similar conditions. The Qf crew were just extremely lucky there were not more substancial obstacles in the overshoot, the torrential rain subdued any fire and so on. Australia really is the lucky country in some respects as we have had a number of seriously close calls that didn't translate into loss of life. This could easily have been a Tenerife style disaster at Sydney airport, (years before the actual Tenerife) the baggage hold was ripped open and luggage strewn across the runway:
https://www.atsb.gov.au/publications.../aair197101202
That's the damage to VH-TJA after the impact in flight with the tail of the DC-8.
Too often, before I retired I saw a lot of heads down, fiddling with the FMS for eg.Taxing, all eyes outside the cockpit. More critical at line up, of course.