Tuesday, July 18, 2006
Lighting the way
A program being tested at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport could help prevent deadly runway accidents. Many aviation officials consider it the most dangerous part of a plane trip: moving across a runway just as another aircraft is taking off. The worst runway incursion occurred in March 1977, when a KLM Boeing 747, attempting to take off from Tenerife in the Canary Islands, collided with a Pan Am 747 coming from the other end of the runway.
Runway incursions happen far more frequently than you might like to think about too - the U.S. had 324 incursions in the fiscal year that ended last fall, including three close calls between commercial jets that were deemed the most serious, according to FAA data. That figure had dropped from 424 incursions in 2000. The system uses a series of computerized lights embedded along a runway to signal pilots and, they say, "It's more useful than the way they now get information – by looking out a cockpit window or relying on controllers."
Lighting the way
Labels: Tenerife Disaster
