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Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

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Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#351

Post by gymbeaux »

diebeforei485 wrote: post #198
kylehotchkiss wrote: post #118

I flew into JFK in December and was surprised the number of concurrent operations going on… landing queues of 5+ planes in the sky for the two runways, long takeoff queues, so many land operations… once you touch down it sure feels like the pilot knows they have to get that plane off the runway ASAP. Felt much more busy than I have previously going through LAX/SFO/London/Dubai. I wonder if the level of traffic at JFK…

The safety issues at JFK stem from the fact that it is a very old airport, built for the turboprop era.

That’s LaGuardia! JFK was built to address this.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#352

Post by chha »

defrost wrote: post #223
curun1r wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The other major concern is running reliable power to the lights. That isn’t something that can happen above ground when crossing runways, so there’s going to be at least some digging up the runway and repaving. Repaving runways isn’t cheap. It has to be done in an expedited manner since airports need all runways available during peak hours, so there’s usually a six-ish hour overnight window for work to get done and t…

> so there’s going to be at least some digging up the runway and repaving. The US doesn't have horizontal directional drilling rigs that go under a runway and pull cable?

Sure they do. But then you have a tunnel under the runway that will flood and potentially freeze. Crumbling concrete and nonflat surfaces is not something you want on a runway or taxiway.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#353

Post by lelandfe »

kube-system wrote: post #203
lelandfe wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We were all deplaned after, and they had to find everyone new flights. They wound up getting me a hotel nearby. So I guess it was unflyable? Easily my worst travel experience.

Was it a multi engine jet? Just wondering, because they should be able to climb out on one engine, but some other planes can’t.

Not a clue, sorry.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#354

Post by jMyles »

jonnybgood wrote: post #183
jMyles wrote: post #126

I want to offer a bit of a different perspective than the one I'm seeing in other comments which (totally reasonably) wonder if a) JFK is too busy or needs some safety upgrades and b) whether voice contact with ATC is the best way to reduce risk during unusual events like incursions. I'm just an amateur enthusiast who listens to a lot of ATC, so take this assessment with that grain of salt: JFK has long had a unique…

Does this same subculture apply to LGA?

It's hard to say, because it's such a different operation and different scale. LGA has two 7,000 foot runways, and no CBP (meaning very few long-haul flights are landing there), as well as all the perimeter rules and curfews... listening to LGA ATC feels more like listening to a small quircky airport, at least to me.

So it's hard to make any kind of comparison.

It will be more telling to see how things settled after the construction is finished.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#356

Post by ralph84 »

innocenat wrote: post #224
hn_user2 wrote: post #43

For those thinking about preventative solutions, there are some existing, all very expensive of course. The simplest is placing a row of red lights in the ground at all intersections to runways. When an airplane is cleared for takeoff and until it is airborne the controller presses a button and turns all these lights red. Pilots are instructed that regardless of clearance, a red light over-rides that, and to never cr…

This diagram suggest that it is installed at the intersection in question (J cross 4L) https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/rwsl/media/JFK.pd...

Yep. Both the intersection American 106 was supposed to take (cross 31L at K) and the intersection they took (cross 4L at J) have runway entrance lights.

According to https://www.faa.gov/air_traffic/technology/rwsl/pet/ the lights don't illuminate until departing aircraft are at 30 knots, so it's possible Delta 1943 was just beginning the takeoff roll and the lights weren't on yet when American 106 decided to cross 4L.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#357

Post by ralph84 »

c2xlZXB5 wrote: post #219

The article mentions runway 4L was being used for takeoffs. In the ATC communications, you can hear them say "American 185, runway 31L at KE, line up and wait" before telling Delta 1943 to cancel their takeoff clearance. And after the near collision, ATC tells American 106 Heavy "we're departing runway 4L." Wouldn't the line up and wait call for American 185 mean that they were departing from both 4L and 31L?

The ATIS recording is here: https://archive.liveatc.net/kjfk/KJFK-D-ATIS-Jan-14-2023-013...

They were landing 4R and 4L, departing 4L and 31L at KE. American 106 ended up departing 31L full length since that's where they had decided to taxi to and it was probably easier to just get rid of them that way rather than have them cross 4L again to depart where everyone else was departing from.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#358

Post by bscphil »

addandsubtract wrote: post #305
thret wrote: post #290

Given that you absolutely never swear (or even waste words) on the radio, I wonder if beginning the transmission with an expletive is actually optimal: it is short, sharp, and immediately conveys the urgency of the command.

Reading the transcript, I thought it might've been a waste of time to start with "Shit...", but listing to the audio does make the following command a lot more urgent and severe. Either way, with all the things going on (and through a pilot's head) at take-off, I'm glad they were able to respond to the message and stop the plane in time.

I don't know how accurate the various videos are, but if they are, the Delta pilot was probably able to visually see the plane on the runway ahead, perhaps even before the tower noticed it. The plane seems to begin decelerating very early, before I'd expect the "cancel takeoff clearance" message to have been fully understood by the pilot.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#359

Post by wlonkly »

dev_tty01 wrote: post #190
christophilus wrote: post #48

The animation in the tweet at the end of the article is something. Based on that, the deceleration looked remarkably fast. I imagine that was quite the ride for the folks in the Delta jet.

I was in a jet taxiing and headed for a runway crossing. I could see out the window a plane on coming in to land on the runway we were about to taxi across. It was clear from our speed that the pilots had no intention of stopping before crossing the runway. I could see it all unfolding and was actually considering taking off my seat belt and running to the cockpit. At that moment the pilot suddenly applied massive br…

> taking off my seat belt and running to the cockpit

People really don't like it when you do that, by the way.

Re: Friday night’s near-disaster at JFK airport

#360

Post by wlonkly »

dylan604 wrote: post #104

DELTA1943: "Alright, and uh, woof!" ATC: "Delta 1943, are you able to taxi or do you need a couple of minutes to run checks?" DELTA1943: "Yeah, we can get off the runway" but they're all going to need a change of underwear!! And I thought the Brits were known for understatement!

I've really enjoyed watching various places transcribe the sound that DL1943 made after "Alright" there. I've seen "Uch", "Huff", "Phew", "Uew", and now "Woof"!
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