jewitts
Looked at the pics. I think what you are referring to is the perimeter road - not much use to an A340. In some of the highway camera images, the runway appears quite close behind the stricken a/c, but that's due to the 'visual shortening' effect any telephoto lens produces.
What's more amazing is, how close to this little river (or other body of water) they came. Plunging in there......