Posted on 08/27/2006 4:38:10 AM PDT by BigBlueJon
Edited on 08/27/2006 5:02:21 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
Possible plane crash in Lexington, KY. My brother works security for Lexington UK Hospital and was just called in. No news locally or on major news outlets yet. I didn't want to post anything for fear of being wrong, but he's still waiting for an official call while on stand-by.
Update from WTVQ 36 Lexington:
A plane has crashed near the Blue Grass Airport this morning. No word on details at this time. We are told it was a commercial aircraft. Versailles Road is blocked as emergency vehicles circle around the site. We have live coverage beginning at 7:20am. Stay with Action News 36 for more details.
Thank you and yours for your service.
That's a very acceptable reason for a 'temporary' absence from the great 'Lone Star State'.
"No evidence exists to suggest that signs/markings were obscured, or any of the other imaginary conditions you've intro'd into the scenario."
Please provide an exact quote and post number for my 'alleged' suggestions that the signs/markings pertaining specifically to the runways were obscured and any other imaginary conditions that you allege I introduced into the scenario. I can not recall any such statements. The only imaginary conditions that I suggested were those in your HYPOTHETICAL analogy of going the wrong way on a freeway and crashing head-on into a school bus. That was YOUR analogy, NOT MINE. I merely expanded upon it to make a point.
"The runway was repaved, the taxi instructions might have been different than the last time they were there. So what. You can cite only one incident, 13 years ago, when someone else was confused."
No, I did not cite any incident. I responded to another poster who cited it and said that "If any other pilots have been confused as to the correct runway, then something is not right with the signs or design." This is a logical deduction (which may or may not be correct), but you chose not to provide evidence or arguments to the contrary or provide your own reasoning. In addition, I believe that most readers would recognize that it is an opinion, not a statement of fact.
"Again, the issue is pilot performance. Taxiways and runways are parts of a system that expects actors to perform as trained and accept some level of performance deviation. The system is not designed to be idiot proof. Such thinking drives up costs, decreases crew awareness and responsibility, etc."
I have stated many times in several different ways that the pilots 'failed miserably', etc. However, you seem to fail to grasp that "systems" are not perfect and often need to be adjusted or upgraded. (For example, Operating Systems like Windows. Have you gotten your monthly updates/patches? LOL) As far as your contention that improved systems decrease crew awareness and responsibility, have you forgotten about the learning curve? And what about the increase in the amount of info that crews must retain with changes to current systems? Does that make them lazy and less responsive?
"I just spoke with another ATP, just to make sure I'm not crazy. He thinks these guys were probably chatting through taxi, or otherwise distracted, but he still can't figure out how two pilots could make this basic error. He finds it indefensible. He said the error was more egregious and less understandable than the AA pilot that snapped the rudder of the Airbus at JFK in 2001. Only thing he could think of was when two pilots repositioning a CRJ were cowboying around at the edge of the flight envelope and crashed the thing. He thought it happened about 5 years ago."
So, another ATP, who wasn't in that cockpit and may or may not have detailed knowledge of LEX, past and present configurations, mechanical condition of the plane, weather conditions, or any of a multitude of other factors, gives you an opinion that the pilots were chatting through the taxi, or otherwise distracted (by what, the flight attendant stripping during take-off? or maybe the plane was on auto-pilot while the flight crew played strip poker? ), and that's the ONLY possible cause of the crash that you will consider, WITH NO OTHER CONTRIBUTING FACTORS. hmmm - I guess that's a fine example of single mindedness.
"I honestly think you're abusing failure analysis and systems design practice in your suppositions of cause. Systems are designed to comprehend and mitigate reasonably avoidable risks. Systems can even comprehend reasonably predictable mistakes, but not something like this."
I'm not a 'failure analysis and systems designer', therefore I can not abuse a practice which I don't have. I have not claimed any expertise, experience, or special knowledge in such or in aviation, nor have I stated any 'suppositions of cause' or conclusions. I have stated reported facts and asked logical questions, followed by logical reasons showing how something may have contributed to the accident. We are all well aware of the direct cause of the accident - taking off from the wrong runway. And everyone also knows that the Captain and First Officer are ultimately responsible for that mistake. What most of us have been discussing has been about possible contributing factors. There is a difference.
Fox just announced that the officer who survived was piloting the plane at the time of the crash.
LEXINGTON, Ky. -- Investigators in Lexington, Ky., say the pilots of a Comair jet that crashed Sunday on takeoff noticed there were no lights on the runway they mistakenly used. It was too short.
Images: Commuter Plane Crash
A National Transportation Safety Board official said the only survivor, the first officer, was piloting the plane. All 49 others on board were killed.
The safety official said the cockpit voice recorder shows the pilots were talking about the absence of lights on the runway, but they didn't report it to the control tower.
Investigators are looking into whether the runway lights or changes made to a taxiway during a repaving project a week ago confused the commuter jet's pilots.
One flight instructor who flies almost every day out of Lexington says he was confused by the redirected taxi route when he was with a student Friday taking off from the main runway.
http://www.wral.com/news/9745895/detail.html
It is
I remember when I was 16 I had a job at a radio station, made a 2000 dollar mistake by not putting someones commercial on a monthly rotation. I was scolded, came home upset and told my mom. I expected my mom to be the soft understanding, sweet woman that she is to tell me it is all okay, well I got that later on, but first I got a lecture. You make mistakes when you are not fully concentrating on what you are doing. You should be thinking A to B to C. not about D and Z when you have not reached point A. It is obvious that the pilots were not committed to making sure they got from A to B. the reason is that they were not thinking enough. It is your job to find out if the price of a 2 liter cola has increased if you are working at a grocery store. It is your job to know what time the top 40 countdown comes on at a radio station, even if the airing time changes due to a football game or something. The pilots could have easily read and studied the new configuration, infact I believe they had a personal responsibility to know as much about the Lexington Airport as possible reguardless of standards.
intrestingly enough, my mother told me that in her job as a nurse, if she give someone the wrong med, they could die. These pilots had 48 lives in their hands and they did not accept that to the point where they could have made sure, took the time and made sure they knew what they were doing.
visualize atleast twice before you do, my mom also said.
and they she told me that the only perfect man on the earth was Jesus and that we will all make mistakes.
I guess some mistakes are just so damn big that perfection looks so perfect and easy in 20/20.
sometimes you are just in the wrong place at the wrong time. sometimes your mind is in the wrong place at the wrong time.
"The fatal crash is the United States' worst airline disaster in nearly five years."
Huh. I wonder what THAT crash was about? (How soon it fades into HISTORY and is forgotten).
I don't know
Mr. RR and I returned from Atlanta on Sunday. We were in the Delta terminal at Hartsfield when news of the crash started rippling through the crowds. It was pretty bad.
My sister's co-worker at the University of Kentucky was on the plane. I didn't learn that until I returned home.
Continued prayers for the victims and those who loved them.
Not really, but I pinged a few folks that do. Sad local news in #914.
Glad you're back safe.
Heartfelt prayers for the victims' loved ones.
There are procedures in place to deal with that aspect of ATC. Not that an incident can't occur because of it....
Wow, to think that if they had simply asked the tower about the lights, this might not have happened.
Simplistic suggestion I'm sure but shouldn't there be something like this available?
Also, I seem to recall a report done on 60 Minutes or some other news magazine about how confusing airport runway and taxiway signage was at airports across the nation.
That was a decade ago, as I recall. I wonder if it has gotten any better.
CNN Breaking news email:
-- FAA acknowledges it violated staffing policies with only one air traffic controller on duty at airport when Comair jet crashed Sunday, killing 49 people.
That will be a contributing factor but not a cause. From what I know so far, this accident was caused by pilot error. I suspect the NTSB will find at least a half dozen contributing factors, but only one cause.
They can, and many are. I regularly fly a
<airplane geek speak>
Mooney 201 with a Garmin MX20 hooked up to a G430, which on the ground centers the airplane on the Jepp airport diagram ($$$ subscription required, of course), with an overlaid 120 degree compass rose
</airplane geek speak>
...which is to say there is a 6" LCD screen in the panel of the 4-seat single engine airplane I fly that does overlay a map of the airplane onto an airport taxiway and runway layout, and shows your heading on the same screen. Similar technology (but with a few extra zeroes on the end of the price tag) is available and was probably equipped on this relatively new jet. I'm sure one of the foci of the NTSB investigation is whether that technology was broken, given an erroneous readout, misprogrammed, or properly set up but ignored, and the reasons for whichever of the above is true.
Thanks. That's good to know.
Well, it is Kentucky, thought outta really open up Fort Knox.
The captain is, of course, ultimately responsible for a successful flight and has to be sure that he is doing the right thing. But in this case, I would argue that he did not realize there was a problem until he ran out of runway. These pilots obviously made mistakes, but we must learn what caused those mistakes and prevent them from happening in the future. Some on this discussion cannot comprehend how someone can do something that stupid. I would ask people to withhold judgment and try to learn as much as we can to prevent similar disasters in the future. We are all human and sometimes the information we observe does not add up right although we are convinced it does. Obviously the messages they had from their observations did not provide the necessary danger signals to warn them that something was very wrong.
Here is my take on what happened:
Some of the airport drawings on this thread seem to indicate that some changes were made recently in the taxiways and the main runway. The earlier version has the main runway at the end of the taxiway. When the plane gets to the end of the taxiway the pilots turn left and are on the runway, they have passed the short runway without taking much note of it. The major construction change seems to have been to add an FAA mandated “safety zone” at the end of the long runway and the taxiway between the short runway and the long one was eliminated. The end of the runway is very near a highway. Lack of a “safety zone” was noted in last winter’s Southwest Airlines accident at Midway where the plane did not stop until it hit a van in the street and killed a 7 year old boy.
I have seen no information on whether the pilots were regulars on this field, although I see that Clay was a resident of Kentucky. If they were somewhat familiar with this field , they probably automatically turned left (and not noting the runway number) when they reached the end of the taxiway. It being close to daylight, they may have concluded that the runway lights had been turned off to early. (It would be interesting to know what they said in their discussion about the lights.) Such an occurrence is not uncommon with lights on timers and the changing length of daylight. I suspect they were distracted by the lack of runway lightning and did not observe the runway number. Unfortunately, due to the 9-ll Islamic terrorists, the door to the pilots area is closed now, but I remember from the old days, both people in the front seats are quite busy flipping switches, doing communications and whatever else is necessary to get the plane ready to get off the ground during the taxiing.
I do not know where the plane sits on the end of the runway before the takeoff run. The runway numbers seem to be quite near the end and may not be visible once the plane is on the runway.
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