Originally Posted by
Plazbot
And then make a 90 degree turn with obvious control issues and stick it between light posts? Don't think so Habibi
Yep. Off the end of 17 at Essendon, there are no safe options. Everything involves ploughing into the general population somehow. This includes putting down on the Tulla, which is absolutely a non-option, period. While it might give the aircraft occupants a glimmer of hope compared to smacking into the shops, towers or billboards, dozens could easily have perished if the King Air had not clipped the DFO before 10am. This includes workers who will have been busy in the freeway construction zone, MickJoeBill.
Vertical obstructions well off the centreline are problematic in a potential case where an aircraft has a severe loss of directional control but still has reasonable hope of levelling out or climbing. But how could the industry possibly sell this corner-case to the community? "
Please support the notion of removing towers etc at DFO, so that if another aircraft loses it, the occupants have a better chance of survival, and we'll then take our chances they don't then slam into your {busy freeway, high school, suburban train line, ...}". There is a chance that this might be reasonable from a quantified risk point of view, but I am pretty sure it is not a compromise that the community will accept. (At present, they more or less accept the emergency services and RPT functions, and many like the hum of TMQ as well... but starting to call for removal of obstacles... FFS that will scare the horses!)
Ultimately I don't think there is a holistic and logical safety argument for making it easier for partially or fully out-of-control aircraft to penetrate densely populated inner suburbia.
I agree that airfields should not be allowed to be penned-in from the inside or the outside, and I'm not in favour of operations at YMEN being curtailed (despite living 800m from the threshold directly in line with 08/26). I'm just countering the notion that the non-aviating community in general could presently successfully be sold a safety argument about drastically off-centreline vertical obstructions or on-field developments.