Luck has run out
Mea culpa. Post, by yours truly, trying to define or delineate a separation between factors factual in nature on the one hand, and factors called 'luck' or good 'fortune' that are products of random chance on the other hand, has rightfully been scorned as sophomoric and otherwise subjected to ridicule. Deservedly so, I see.
I wonder what the probability calculation would be if one took scheduled passenger service airports in the continental US, then identified those which have proximity to another airfield which could, by luck, chance or mistake, be mistaken for the correct airport - - in situations akin to the SWA incident discussed in this thread and/or the recent Dreamlifter incident -- and then let us assume that the approach has been flown such that the touchdown point is comparable (relative to percentage of lineal distance of straight-line concrete in front of the pointy end of the aircraft). Given the set of 'correct airports in scheduled airline service' matched with airfields which hold some likelihood of being mistaken for the correct ones, what is the probability that runway length at the incorrect airfield will be inadequate? Adequate only with full-on braking? This type of probabilistic assessment was what I was trying to articulate before. Anyway. By the (air)way, no one ever has heard of a U S Navy jet jockey landing on the wrong aircraft carrier flight deck, have they? Makes me wonder...