See incident 5 in ‘TAWS Saves’ as another example of where an aircraft attempts to land somewhere other than a runway. The presentation that accompanied the paper (not currently available) provided a very clear view of the possible confusion that can be created by street lights, but ... the aircraft had already deviated from the correct flight path before the crew were ‘visual’. Again it shows how error can result from a combination of factors; it is these factors which need to be identified and either eliminated or mitigated with threat and error management.

Final defenses usually reside with the crew – and don’t overlook the possibility that both crew members suffered (the same) error in this incident, or if they did not, then further error prevented intervention.

The appropriate use of modern technology can provide appropriate warnings – the use of RAAS (PEI post 14), particularly as an error detector might have prevented this incident. But this equipment also has benefit in other situations; RAAS might have prevented the KLEX incorrect runway takeoff and the KSEA incident.

The identification of ‘clusters’ of incidents/accidents, which appear to have a common cause (error) and/ or solutions must indicate something to us surely?

Instead of the Monday morning quarterbacks and armchair analysts seeking more negative aspects, please provide some positive, helpful safety advice, by determining how all of us can avoid making such an error until our aircraft are appropriately equipped.

TAWS would not, I'm sure, have prevented this occurrence?
- I don't think we can! What is wrong with having warning lights as an interim measure?

…but RAAS would… RTFQ or something similar. TEM ? :) An error provoking situation? :p

alf5071h

safety rec:

always place the localizer and course of runway for takeoff...tune and identify prior to taxi out...same for landing and in this case tune up ILS11, place front course in HSI and the back course would lead you to runway 29


last time I checked, you didn't need any special equipment for the above.

and if you are on a runway and the needle isn't centered, your not on the correct runway

this would have helped in the kentucky crash, the SEA alaska airlines wrong runway takeoff and the landing on the taxiway at EWR.


jon

nerik, eastern wiseguy, earthmover, others. yes, there were indeed 2 landings on the same taxiway at gatwick, the 1-11 and an air malta 737.
the issues have been somewhat addressed since then. some background - gatwick has parallel runways but only one can used at any one time since they are too close to each other. the northern most runway is shorter and is used as a contingency for when the main is unavailable due work, or an incident. there's no ils on the northern, it's visuals or sras only.
the main factor was airport layout/lighting. the lights visible from approach during northern runway 26R/08L were confusing when compared to the lights visible on main runway 26L/08R operations. it's a little difficult to explain here without a picture but essentially the picture to pilots was very similar when either runway was in use and it could easily be misconstrued (ironically, probably more so if you were familiar with gatwick) as to which set of lights was which. when the northern runway is in use the only lights visible now are those on the runway. the taxiway lights are unidirectional and hence suppressed in the landing direction.
we also now have a system in the tower called an 'approach monitoring aid' or AMA which uses the radar to monitor (!) the approach (!) of the aircraft. it can be set to either runway and emits a audible warning when an aircraft reaches two miles and is off the centreline. at this point ATC is to ask if the aircraft is established/visual, if the aircraft gets to one mile, regardless of the pilot response, if the alarm is still sounding, the aircraft is sent around.
as an aside, in the 1-11 incident there was a ba 737 on the taxiway at the time of the landing and the 1-11 stopped 80m short of them.
there's bound to be some resolvable issues in this incident too. that may involve the changing of the airport layout or lights, addition of equipment or addressing of some crm issues. most likely a combination of all, and more. let's allow the investigators to do their job and learn from what they discover.

Hangten I agree totally my only input was for sake of clarity.Let the investigators do the work

EW

Pilots Returned to Duty
 

http://www.nj.com/search/index.ssf?/...ger?nnj&coll=1

From Today's NJ Star Ledger. The last paragraph mentions that the piolts involved in the incident underwent 'retraining' and have been returned to duty.

NTSB: Lighting A Factor In '06 Newark Taxiway Landing
 

"The National Transportation Safety Board's report concluded that "the flight crew's misidentification of the parallel taxiway as the active runway" led to the mistake, but added that night lighting conditions were a contributing factor."

http://wcbstv.com/local/newark.taxiw....2.689698.html

Just to add an ironic codicil, after "retraining" the captain's first flight was to RSW (Fort Myers, FL ). Where the main runway was closed and the landing surface? You guessed it..... the taxiway. There but for the grace........:)

I say "Well done, boys!" landing on a 70' wide taxiway, promote him!!
Seriously though, remember the BIA one-eleven landing on the taxiway at LGW one night? After the incident BIA became widely known as Bung It Anywhere.......

The report says the taxiway lights were green and brighter than the white runway lights. Ordinary colour blindness makes green indistinguishable from red (but white?). There is no mention of any check of the crew's vision before returning them to duty. The brightness of the lights has been readjusted.

It amazes me how much brighter the green taxiway centerline lights are than the runway edge lights at Newark. Additionally, the fact that an airport as busy as Newark has NO taxiway edge lights is ridiculous. The New York/New Jersey Port Authority has to share some blame IMHO.