I wonder how the insurance companies will deal with this, and what the NTSB will come up with as the cause?
Joe
I wonder how the insurance companies will deal with this, and what the NTSB will come up with as the cause?
Joe
Someone posted a claim to another forum that the displaced threshold was recently removed or moved nearly all the way to the end. Supposedly, the EPA wanted to put a system to monitor lead emissions due to 100LL at the end of the runway, and cited the displaced threshold to claim the installation would be safely out of the way of aircraft operations. The claim is that the airport management moved the displaced threshold to prevent the EPA from emplacing its boxes.
Makes a good story. Don't know if it's true.
In any case, the pilot was a student and I don't fault him much for coming in a bit low (curiously, the same forum says the FBO on the field dictates no-flap landings). The person driving the SUV *really* should have been watching. Heck, I check the approach path when I travel on a local major highway that passes the end the runways at Sea-Tac.
Ron Wanttaja
The first one is from 6-12-11 and the second one is from 4-4-12.
My friend Jay Cullum used to keep his P-51 at Dallas Redbird. Once coming home in IMC weather, he had to fly the ILS into Addison. He was in clouds till breaking out about 400 feet ,and landed ok.
Later he got to thinking that maybe this wasn't too safe, so he went back and flew the approach in good vfr and was shocked to see how many big buildings were near the final approach path.
I have a little 51 time, would never want to have to fly an ILS is one. Even if you have good ifr instruments, the controls are more sensitive than many gen av airplanes,and there is more to do, ie the flaps have 4 positions and that is after you lower the gear which requires reaching low on the left front of the side panel and moving a lever. It is not just flipping a switch on the panel.
Most of all, you are just moving so much faster ,perhaps 150 on downwind, and 110 on final, about twice as fast as a 172 might be going. Your pattern speed to lower the gear is faster than the top speed of a 172.So you have that much less time to get things done and stay ahead or at least abreast of it all.
But man, what an airplane, and what an engine!
Last edited by Bill Greenwood; 11-06-2012 at 01:10 PM.
You can see the displaced threshold markings in the video, if you look hard. The plane would have landed past the threshold. He was, perhaps, a little low, but not particularly so. Were there operating VASI? Even then, once landing is assured in the first third of the runway...
Very short final, rounding out, he probably never saw the car, nor should he be expected to have seen it.
It doesn't matter if there is a red octagonal sign or not. Stop means stop. There is a reason for the marking. (I know, people who stop when they are supposed to at regular stops signs are a rarity. All the rest scare the #@$% out of me, especially when I am on a bicycle.) People who were supposed to be familiar with the airport should even know why those lines are there. To me it sounds like careless and reckless...driving.
I don't have the regs handy right now, but it seems that this kind of hazard would be addressed in airport design.