I find that a bit hard to believe. T-VASIS boxes were not runway specific
That is perfectly understandable on reflection. Just talked to one of the DCA T-Vasis techs of that era and he recalled the incident. I was wrong as it turned out (blame the advancing years) It was nothing to do with individual runways. The boxes that were reversed were the Runway 01 vertical boxes 1 to 6. Hence the first (top) overshoot light called No 1 was inadvertently placed on the concrete base of the one of the undershoot lights. Box No 2 and 3 lights same thing. They became the undershoot lights. Of course passing through the 3 degree slope the view from the pilot's seat was normal.