Aborted takeoff, Car on Rwy, & More at LAX
 

I've had more close calls with collisions with ground vehicles at LAX than any other airport.

A Los Angeles World Airports Employee No Less
 

Good God!! An airport employee? If ANY unique group is (perhaps should be?) trained in how to operate ground vehicles at a Major Airport, it should be the airport's own employees. Now, the LAWA management wants to beat up on the employee. Was he thoroughly trained in ground operations? Did he have an operative radio tuned to South Ground? We will learn more, later. For now, I suspect that LAWA is wagging their finger on the wrong heading. Oh, I forgot... LAWA is a quasi governmental organization, by definition, unable to do wrong. :sad:

No GPS navigation?
 

How much can it cost to equip all vehicles authorized for airport operation to have a GPS navigation system. May not be perfect, but certainly good enough to avoid such blunders. And cheap compared to potential consequences, including an aborted takeoff.

Good on the alerts in the tower and quick controller reaction.

Did I hear the "consultant" right. "nothing will happen to the passengers if they run into a vehicle" ????

Taking off from Malé, Maldives, circa 100kn, Luton van drove across in front of us. I observed that, if it maintained heading and speed, it would be well clear and continued t/o. It did and we missed.
Subsequent rethink suggested that, had it, for some reason, stopped on the runway, an instant abort would have meant we'd have hit it less hard.
My finding at the cerebral Board of Inquiry was that I should have rejected.

Not nearly as dramatic as a runway incursion but I saw a 747 have to stop rather quickly on a taxiway at Toronto as a van ran out in front of him, obviously without looking. I spoke to a pilot about it later and he basically said that it was North America, these things happen.

Of course it was. Did they then shout you and your partner out to dinner for making a successful judgement call under significant time constraints whilst bearing total responsibility?
Didn't think so.
Just remember that not one of them has ever made a decision in a similar time frame with similar consequences whilst holding similar responsibility. They're just along for the ride.

BASIL


Your story reminds me of the 707 incident in the 1970's when a certain airline's flight training manager was taking off from Toronto and an aircraft taxied across the runway quite a long way further down. He realised he would be airborne before reaching it but applied more power, climbed over the offending aircraft and continued to London.


He was praised for avoiding the aircraft but was reprimanded for continuing to London having overboosted the JT3D's.With the RR Conway engines it would not have mattered as they had Ultra to limit the boost.

Me thinks that Basil was referring to a thought process inside his own head, rather than a formal Board of Inquiry.

Like this?

http://s18.postimg.org/nq3npn7g9/adsb_cars.jpg

Thinking... "just keep going, just keep going..." :E

Yes, I was but didn't make it very clear.
If we'd collided, I wouldn't have had a leg to stand on - probably literally as well as legally.:ooh:

LAX like most major US airports has ASDE-X surface detection equipment. The system tracks aircraft and vehicle movement on runways and taxiways using a variety of sensors.

ASDE-X has safety logic to alert the controller of possible future collisions.

http://www.ainonline.com/sites/defau..._display-5.jpg
(Pictured: SAAB Sensis ASDE-X Terminal)

My close calls with ground vehicles at LAX almost always occurred on C-8 or C-7 during the transition from taxilane C eastbound to taxiway B.

Because of the extreme oversteer required during the hard right turn to keep the right main truck on the load bearing part of the pavement, most ground vehicle drivers presumed I was continuing straight ahead on taxilane C and would pull away from the stop signs on the roadway crossing C-7 or C-8 which ran parallel to B.

I used to tell my F/O's that if they saw what they felt was an imminent collision, to go ahead and apply the brakes because by the time I could react from them screaming at me to stop, it could be too late.

I’ve twice operated into LAX (in a 777-300: easy to miss :rolleyes:) and twice have had to do an emergency stop on the taxiway due to vehicles cutting in front of me. If this is normal here, then I’m not surprised by this incident at all.

And I thought New York drivers were bad.:)

It's a serious offense for the workers if the are cited for a driving offense (fail to yield or stop) on LAX roads and streets. They are considered the same as city streets and points are assigned to your drivers license record. After 3 points or something they lose the privilege to drive at LAX and most likely the job as well.
In this case it appears the technology worked as designed.

The ASDE-X surface detection system worked as designed.

If you haven't driven a car at a complex airport on manoeuvring areas, you have no idea how easy it is to drive onto restricted areas, or even the wrong taxiway.
Air-side topography is generally flat, the low driving height in a car relative to aircraft cockpit heights, plus the wide taxiways are factors that contribute to runway incursions. Also, ground controllers almost always want the vehicle operator to expedite.
At some airports, it is actually easier to drive on manoeuvring areas at night, because of the colour of air-side lighting delineating intersections, taxiways and runways.

A study of runway incursions will reveal that more pilots than vehicle operators have made wrong turns air-side.

The ho polloi have no idea how common incursions are. As a pilot who has landed at many unfamiliar airports in a high-wing tail-dragger, I truly appreciate the difficulty in taxiing towards the right exit and apron.

evansb, that's one of the things I liked about the B747: the high viewpoint of airport taxiways - still doesn't totally prevent errors :sad:

I cannot speak for LAX, but I can for LAS.

First point, all major airports in the US now have ASDE-X whereby controllers not only "see" aircraft on the movement area, but also vehicles (although they do not ident what type).

Second, all airport workers who drive on the movement area MUST be trained to a certain standard (it's mandated by FAR 139) of driving. It requires you be able to operate your vehicle safely at night (the night test covers both day and night). There is a written exam as well as the practical test. You must pass both to get the M designation on your badge. And......you only take this test if your work requires you to be on the movement area. Getting the R for ramp is a totally different ball game and restricts you to ramp only and you must use designated service roads ONLY.

What we don't (yet) know in this case, is which department this guy worked for and what he was doing out in the movement area. Also, if he was authorized to be there, was he monitoring the correct frequency? Was he new and just trained? A lot of unanswered questions so far.

Runway incursions do happen, they are rare. Having said that, there is always a reason for them and until we know what happened here, its speculation.

With regards to cutting off an aircraft, I can add a few pointers, too. In an airport environment, vehicles ALWAYS give way to aircraft (or should), that's the rule. However, for some folks it's hard to know whether an aircraft is about to move or not (even if he/she is on the correct frequency). Airport ops only ever get the one-sided story from the ATC folks and they do not usually get the pilot's version. Therefore, it is difficult to determine a fair judgment. Nevertheless, at most airports, if ops gets a call from tower (and finds the offender), then they have to respond and it is an automatic citation - with no defense/excuse/waiver.

We need to have far more info here than the LA times and even the airport "spokesperson" is relaying.............;)