Originally Posted by U R NumberOne
At least that proves the value of opposite direction runway inspections - if things have gone wrong, the driver has the best chance of getting out of the way.
Maybe in this case. LHR have done it that way since an incident in the '70s but at LGW we do it with the traffic due to the layout of the RETs, only being able to vacate to the north etc etc. It's all been risk assessed, method statemented and safety case analysed. The subject comes up every couple of years and we re-examine it but at present on balance we regard it as the better of the options.
Years ago, it wasn't uncommon to have Airfield ops people who had 'shared' the runway with an aircraft (myself included) but I think that we're so much more aware of the runway incursion issue now that the chances of it happening within our culture are vanishingly small.
The worst aspect of these cases isn't just that they happened, but that the individuals and their respective organisations, have a 'denial' culture that prevents them from sharing this safety-critical information. What if the circumstances surrounding this latest runway incursion are waiting to be repeated at another airport, where a disaster could be prevented by sharing the experience?
Re - Speaking French in France. Of course both the CDG controllers and the Air France pilots are perfectly capable of speaking Aviation English, so there's no practical excuse. It must be chauvanism. It's a French word, after all! I know of a Belgian lady (former controller, pilot) who was contracted to teach Aviation English to all the Ground staff at a French airport; they were then banned from using it by their Senior Mgmt. Crazy!
The Odd One