American Airlines jet goes off runway in Jackson Hole, Wyoming
 

American Airlines jet goes off runway in Wyoming
(AP)

JACKSON, Wyo. (AP) — An American Airlines jet went past the end of a snowy runway while landing at Wyoming's Jackson Hole Airport on Wednesday, but no one was injured and the plane was not damaged, officials said. Airline spokesman Ed Martelle said Flight 2253 from Chicago "had a long rollout" when it landed at 11:37 a.m. Wednesday. The plane came to rest on a hard surface and did not go off into grass or brush, he said. There were 175 passengers, two pilots and four flight attendants on board the Boeing 757, Martelle said.

Ray Bishop, director of the Jackson Hole Airport, said Wednesday that there were no injuries and no damage to the airplane, which he said went into deep snow 658 feet past the end of the runway. That distance included a 300-foot paved safety apron and 358 feet of dirt beyond that.
Light snow was falling when the plane landed, with visibility at about 1.5 miles, Bishop said. The runway had some snowy patches, but its surface afforded good braking friction, he said. Martelle said airline officials were trying to determine why the plane went off the runway.

Speaking in a conference call that began at about 1:30 p.m., Bishop said it might take an additional hour to reopen the airport and flights were being diverted elsewhere. "As you know, this is a very busy time of year for us," Bishop said. "The snow's fantastic at the ski resort." The National Weather Service said Jackson Hole had received about 7 inches of snow since midnight.

Airport officials brought stairs to the plane so passengers could exit, and crews used bulldozers to pull the airliner back onto the runway.
The airport's only runway is 6,400 feet long, which Bishop said is a little shorter than normal for airports handling commercial flights. Another airplane went off the end of the runway last month, and such events happen periodically there, he said.

- don't you just love it?

Getting to be a somewhat regular occurance with AA.
One wonders...another low drag/reduced flap/idle reverse scenario?
Time will tell.

411A I would have bet anything that would be one of the first here to critique this incident. The weather time was varying between 1/2 and 1 mile in snow. I find it hard to believe that the crew used anything but 30 flaps and once on the ground max reverse. The question is of course where did they touch down on the 6,400' runway and what was the condition of the runway at that time?

How does he know? Last time I flew into the US, it was standard procedure not to offer any info on braking action.

we always get braking action reports.

I've been to Jackson (Hole) Wyoming. Magnificent terrain...awe inspiring....but any mountainous area airport can have certain visual illusions. I don't have enough data to fully understand what happened.

as most of you know, the indicated air speed is the same for an approach at high altitude airports as well as sea level airports...but the resultant true air speed makes for a higher ground speed (at the high altitude airport).

I'm sure the pilots knew that if they had been there before.

every operation at a high altitude airport should be a ''max effort'' by the crew

Metar Kjac 291656z 22011kt 3/4sm -sn Bkn004 Ovc010 M04/m07 A2916
Speci Kjac 291725z 23009kt 1/2sm Sn Bkn004 Ovc010 M04/m07 A2916
Metar Kjac 291751z 22007kt 3/4sm -sn Bkn004 Ovc010 M04/m06 A2915
Speci Kjac 291843z 24010kt 1sm -sn Bkn004 Ovc019 M03/m06 A2913
Metar Kjac 291856z 24012kt 3/4sm -sn Bkn019 Ovc025 M03/m06 A2912
Metar Kjac 292051z 20004kt 2sm -sn Bkn016 Ovc026 M02/m04 A2909

BOAC:

Without a bit of history, the statement does seem absurd. Here is some context:

The runway is 6,300 feet in length at an elevation of 6,500, msl. The airport is owned by the county who planned a long time ago to lengthen the runway by approximately 1,000 feet. But, the environmentalists got the federal government involved in some kind of "funny" land swap, which placed the airport in the Teton National Park.

The U.S. National Park Service (USNPS) then put the lid on the runway expansion, using not only federal supremacy, but national park precepts of "park environment first." The USNPS couldn't care less about air operations safety. It's all about the environment with them. That would be "okay" except the airport was there first, then some land useless to the ambience of the park was shoved inside of the park boundaries for no reason other than to put a lid on the airport, but without limiting the overwhelming desire of the public to use this remote airport.

Another factor: the airport is literally in a hole, with high terrain all around, yet sufficient navigable airspace exists for a lengthy ILS from the north and now a decent, also lengthy, RNP AR from the south. But, because of the terrain the terminal area is a non-radar operation. (They could augment the radar with beacon interrogators, but the USNPS would likely veto that.) In any case, with radar some aircraft spacing relief would result, but because of the terrain the missed approach tracks would remain unchanged, just as the approach transitions would remain unchanged. Thus, if a missed approach is required the crew is faced with another 85-plus mile circuit to get back to the airport via the ILS (same for the RNP AR, which not all users can use, by any means). Thus, the pressure to land on a runway of marginal length is greater than most air carrier airports.

I know, the crews need to be ever diligent and disciplined. But, an additional 1,000 feet of runway would have prevented many overruns to which the gentleman referred.

I seem to recall a USAF C130 either departed or missed at this airport and crashed into terrain due to navigational errors.

I've flown into a number of US mountainous area airports (which are designated as SPECIAL airports by the FAA). Day VFR even requires good thinking as turbulence, wind, windshear can all come out of nowhere (acutally we know where, but you can't see it).

Night or IMC is tough...you have to be right. no slop. people who learned to fly in Kansas need not apply (no offense, you guys have some t storms but that's another story).

so be careful out there.

Off another board:


"20 excursions at JAC in last 36 months when the new airport manager started keeping track (he is a retired AF Pilot). This is the first for AA. United and Skywest have the most Part 121 excursions. Corporate jets next only two were GA piston."

Aterpster, I think that if you reconsider your inference at # 7, that overruns can be avoided by having longer runways, the logic of the argument is flawed.
Whatever the length of runway, and irrespective of the circumstances of it’s location, any aircraft should be able to stop in the distance available as dictated by the calculated landing weight – distance required.

Failure to stop within the required landing distance might arise from a number of sources.
The maligned primary candidate – human (pilot) error is in part considered in the calculations by provision of a distance safety margin (distance factor).
Aspects of technical failure might be encompassed by excluding reverse on the landing calculations, yet is available for most landings.
From the scant information so far, the perennial poor weather / runway conditions appear to be factors, which in turn could include poor communication to the crew – they didn’t know (but perhaps reasonably could have taken precautions).
More likely are factors of organisation:-
The FAA does not mandate the use of contaminated runway landing performance, although many operators do have and use suitable data. However, there could be many misunderstandings in its use (cf Midway), not least the FAA recommendation to use a 15 % factor which might only cover distance errors in planning and data assumption, resulting in no distance safety margin at all, and thus the need for full reverse, max braking and a ‘fair wind.

Let’s not prejudge the situation by suggesting problems and solutions, but with hindsight assessing similar events, the ‘accident’ probably commenced much earlier in the flight with information, assessment, judgement, and decision making which all came together at the runway location.
Additional length, safety areas, systems etc, only mitigate something which commenced much earlier. If these issues reoccur, ’such events happen periodically - 20 in 36 months !!!’, then this was an accident waiting to happen.

could of, should ofs regarding airport design or location are not of interest to the passenger, albeit they should be of interest to the local economy.

If it is unsafe to land then the airport should be closed or retricted to only certain types of aircraft.

Jackson Hole is a rough airport, mind you not as bad as Aspen, Eagle, or Sun Valley, but still a bit tricky when the weather gets bad. I just flew out of KJAC a couple weeks ago and it was tough, the braking action gets bad fast on that runway.

That said I do think American has some serious training deficiencies. I watched years back when a Super 80 flew a very unstable approach and dragged a wing in Las Vegas after erroneously lining up with the taxiway. Landing incidents and accidents seem to happen much too regularly. Airlines that operate into much more difficult airports (like Alaska Airlines) seems to maintain a much better safety record.

I'm too lazy to look up the charts...does this runway downslope?

It looked like another lovely day in JAC:

Plane skids off runway in Jackson Hole | KIDK CBS 3 - News, Weather and Sports - Idaho Falls - Pocatello - Blackfoot, ID - Idaho Falls, Pocatello, Blackfoot - Idaho | Local & Regional

.......for an airport at 6,451 MSL with a runway 6,300 feet long and operating regular scheduled FAR 121 ops in snow country.

AirNav: KJAC - Jackson Hole Airport

Without knowing why they went off the end, either marginal braking or landing long will probably be the outcome. Pilots who land long are usually the answer. I have landed as the first flight of the day at an airport at high altitude and in my 737 realized that when I came out of reverse at 60 knots I was going to have an overrun because of braking action nil so used reverse to stop. The brakes were useless. We had no braking action reports because we were the first flight in about 6AM and the first flight in after they closed the airport for the night.

The guys that really scare me were watching the GA jet guys. Scary stuff, especially considering their training issues, when dealing with snow and winter conditions.

I wonder

now mind you I'm a pilot and not an engineer...but the lower bypass engines like the JT8D by Pratt and Whitney were routinely used to back up on the ground *power back procedures.

the newer high bypass engines aren't.

so...I'm thinking that when used in earnest, the older engines reverse capabilities might have been a bit better than the more efficent higher or ultra high bypass engines.

and to me, landing a 757 on a 5700 foot runway at sea level (orange county calif) is much easier than landing the same plane at a 6300 foot runway at over 6000 feet elevation.

US Air Carriers under FAR Part 121 are suppose to land in 60% or less of the runway distance.

With 14 foot Hamilton Standards the breaking action is always good.

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