
SFO near miss might have triggered aviation disaster - milesf
http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/07/10/exclusive-sfo-near-miss-might-have-triggered-greatest-aviation-disaster-in-history/
======
ddeck
Attempts to take off from or land on taxiways are alarmingly common, including
those by Harrison Ford:

    
    
      Harrison Ford won't face disciplinary action for landing on a taxiway at John Wayne Airport [1]
    
      Serious incident: Finnair A340 attempts takeoff from Hong Kong taxiway [2]
    
      HK Airlines 737 tries to take off from taxiway [3]
    
      Passenger plane lands on the TAXIWAY instead of runway in fourth incident of its kind at Seattle airport [4]
    
    

[1] [http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-ford-taxiway-
agr...](http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-ford-taxiway-
agreement-20170331-story.html)

[2] [https://news.aviation-safety.net/2010/12/03/serious-
incident...](https://news.aviation-safety.net/2010/12/03/serious-incident-
finnair-a340-attempts-takeoff-from-hong-kong-taxiway/)

[3] [https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/hk-airlines-
tries...](https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/hk-airlines-tries-to-
take-off-from-taxiway-316283/)

[4]
[http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-337864...](http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-3378645/Passenger-
plane-lands-TAXIWAY-instead-runway-fourth-incident-kind-Seattle-airport.html)

~~~
anovikov
This is facilitated by the fact that in some airports, taxiways and runways
are similar and sometimes even used interchangeably (!), i.e. a runway may be
remarked as taxiway and vice versa. So it's not 'how can he be so dumb'
moment, in some case you have no way to tell the difference unless you just
know.

~~~
gambiting
It feels like it could be solved incredibly easily by a row of lights at the
beginning/end of both the taxiway and the runway, bright red for taxiway,
bright green for the runway. If you are attempting to land on the strip marked
red, then you are doing something wrong. In case that the taxiway is
legitimately used for landing, change the colours around.

I guess it hasn't been done for "reasons", I'd be quite interested in hearing
why.

~~~
dgoldstein0
this sounds like the start of a good idea, but we should choose something that
works for colorblind people and red/green colorblind people too.

~~~
gambiting
Stupid question - can you be certified as a commercial pilot if you are
colourblind?

~~~
briandear
You can’t even be certificated as a Private Pilot if you are colorblind.

~~~
deelowe
Why do people comment on things they know nothing about? Of course you can.

~~~
pdelbarba
It's HN.... I get a good laugh out of all these aviation related threads.
Understandably your average CS undergrad doesn't have much real aeronautical
knowledge but that doesn't stop everyone from blowing up the comments every
time the word 'airplane' is uttered.

------
charlietran
There's an mp3 of the radio chatter here:

[https://forums.liveatc.net/atcaviation-audio-clips/7-july-
ks...](https://forums.liveatc.net/atcaviation-audio-clips/7-july-ksfo-
ac759-go-around/)

> Audio from the air traffic controller communication archived by a user on
> LiveATC.net and reviewed by this newspaper organization showed how a the
> confused Air Canada pilot asks if he’s clear to land on 28R because he sees
> lights on the runway.

> “There’s no one on 28R but you,” the air controller responds.

> An unidentified voice, presumably another pilot, then chimes in: “Where’s
> this guy going. He’s on the taxiway.”

> The air controller quickly tells the Air Canada pilot to “go around.”
> telling the pilot “it looks like you were lined up for Charlie (Taxiway C)
> there.”

> A United Airlines pilot radios in: “United One, Air Canada flew directly
> over us.”

> “Yeah, I saw that guys,” the control tower responds.

~~~
desdiv
.

~~~
Aloha
There is a very good technical reason we still use AM.

AM is not prone to capture effect, wherein the loudest signal captures the
receiver. With AM, you can hear multiple people talking on top of each other
at the same time.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capture_effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capture_effect)

For uncontrolled radio situations where you have a number of unknown people
who need to access a radio channel, neither digital nor encryption bring any
wanted benefits.

As a note - the audio from this recording is very clear to me - I've heard far
worse out of scratchy narrowband FM.. with AM the weaker the signal generally
the quieter it is - but not generally that much noisier.

~~~
tialaramex
Mmm. Here's the thing, I think we heard a lot of the same arguments before DSC
took off for marine radio.

They too have uncontrolled radio, a large number of unknown people who need to
communicate with whoever happens to be nearby, they have more powerful
transmitters owned by governments that "need" to shout down less powerful ones
on transport vessels occasionally.

Now, maritime radio IS a different environment. I'm not suggesting that DSC
should just be dropped in as a replacement for AM analogue transceivers on
planes, but I _am_ saying that I don't buy the theory that it so happens AM
analogue is the right choice and not just the result of inertia.

~~~
pdelbarba
I've used both marine (FM) and airband (AM) radios. My marine experience was
in a relatively uncluttered environment (Cleveland) so take this with a grain
of salt but I found that you rarely had people talking over each other in that
environment, especially with it's limited propagation. Airband on the other
hand is almost always a very high radio traffic environment if you are
actively switching between tower, departure and center channels throughout the
flight. It becomes imperative to be able to tell when someone stepped on ATC
and you didn't get some message.

------
Animats
Here's a night approach on 28R at SFO.[1] Same approach during the day.[2] The
taxiway is on the right. It's a straight-in approach over the bay. The runway,
like all runways at major airports worldwide, has the standardized lighting
that makes it very distinctive at night, including the long line of lights out
into the bay. This was in clear conditions. WTF? Looking forward to reading
the investigation results.

The planes on the taxiway are facing incoming aircraft as they wait for the
turn onto the runway and takeoff. So they saw the Air Canada plane coming
right at them. That must have been scary.

[1]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNMtMYUGjnQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNMtMYUGjnQ)
[2]
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mv7_lzFKCSM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mv7_lzFKCSM)

~~~
lucb1e
> WTF? Looking forward to reading the investigation results.

I'm not an expert, but given what you said, I suppose it'll just end up
equating to "Human error. Happens."

~~~
hueving
I suggest you read ntsb investigations of some major commercial aviation
events like this. It is never just "human error. Happens."

They are always full of excellent recommendations, points of failure, etc.

~~~
verytrivial
I agree. Check out the NTSB report[1] for the crash into a neighborhood in
Queens[2]. 200-odd pages of very sober, rational (and interesting) discussion
of how a pilot ended up snapping the vertical stabilizer off an A300. There
are many factors leading up to what ends up being summarized as pilot error.

[1]
[https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/AccidentReports/Reports/...](https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/AccidentReports/Reports/AAR0404.pdf)
[2]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_587](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Airlines_Flight_587)

~~~
pmoriarty
This kind of analysis is aided by the airline industry having very strict
training and procedures that flight and ground crew are required to follow,
along with regulations that equipment has to comply with.

With them, you can see, for instance, where a pilot or mechanic did not follow
procedure, was not trained adequately, or maybe some equipment was out of spec
and wasn't caught in a checklist that should have been followed by the
maintenance crew, etc.

Compared to the airline industry, most software engineering is much more of a
fly by the seat of your pants phenomenon where anything goes, and there's
little standardization, process, or regulations that the entire industry has
agreed on and actually follows. Such a Wild West approach definitely has a lot
of upsides like speed of development, flexibility, freedom to innovate, and so
on. But can have a cost in safety, reproduceability, accountability, and
analysis of what actually went wrong or how to fix it next time.

------
watson
English is not my native language, but shouldn't the headline have read "SFO
near miss would have triggered aviation disaster"? "Might" seems to indicate
that something else happened afterwards as a possible result of the near miss

~~~
grecy
I agree.

English is my first language, and the more I read the headline, the more I see
it as

"Something terrible happened, and the near miss is possibly the cause".

~~~
MBCook
When I fist saw the headline that's why I went to read it. I wanted to know
how a near miss 'possibly caused' the biggest disaster in airline history.

The story was very interesting. The title is technically valid. But as another
native speaker I think it's very confusing.

------
tmsh
The moral of this story for me is: be that "another pilot." To be clear,
"another pilot" of another aircraft. Not as clear as it could be just like the
title of this article is ambiguous.

The moral of this story for me is: call out immediately if you see something
off. He's the real hero. Even if the ATC controller immediately saw the plane
being misaligned at the same time - that feedback confirming another set of
eyes on something that is off couldn't have hurt. All 1000 people on the
ground needed that feedback. Always speak up in situations like this.

~~~
theGimp
Good observation. If you're wrong, you suffer a brief moment of embarrassment.
If you're right, you might prevent a disaster.

Speaking up is a no-brainer.

~~~
bovitclan
I don't mean to be a downer, but you could certainly cause an accident by
calling out an observation which was faulty. I agree with the sentiment that
you should speak up when you see something amiss, but let's not kid ourselves
that, like every decision, it comes with inherent risk.

~~~
mckoss
Making an aircraft go-around can never cause an accident - the missed approach
path for any landing aircraft is always kept clear.

------
WalterBright
In the early 1960s, a pilot mistook a WW2 airfield for Heathrow, and landed
his 707 on it, barely stopping before the end of the runway.

The runway being too short to lift a 707, mechanics stripped everything out of
it they could to reduce the weight - seats, interiors, etc. They put barely
enough gas in it to hop over to Heathrow, and managed to get it there safely.

The pilot who landed there was cashiered.

~~~
abritinthebay
“Cashiered”?

~~~
schoen
It means 'fired' (maybe more common in English outside the U.S.?).

[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cashier#English](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/cashier#English)

~~~
ajeet_dhaliwal
I've lived 22 years of my life in the UK and 12 in North America and never
heard of this before so I don't think it can be particularly common. I've
heard of being 'laid off', 'fired', 'let go', 'terminated', 'made redundant',
'purged', but never this. Based on this link
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cashiering](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cashiering)
it might be a military way of saying it so perhaps the poster has some
background in that field.

~~~
acchow
I have never heard the usage of this word - I assumed the commenter was
inventing a probably-understandable, slightly humorous usage on the fly which
I've found to be a fairly common habit among ultra-intelligent people.

------
mate_soos
Before crying pilot error, we must all read Sydney Dekker's A Field Giude to
Understading "Human Error" (and fully appreciate why he uses those quotes).
Don't immediately assign blame to the sharp end. Take a look at the blunt one
first. Most likely not a pilot error. Assigning blame is a very human need,
but assigning it to the most visible and accessible part is almost always
wrong.

~~~
mckoss
I can't imagine any scenario where this is not pilot error (unless you had a
power failure of the airport lighting systems).

~~~
wyldfire
Well, yes -- but the intent of making this deeper assessment is to get at the
root of why the pilot may have made the error.

Let's say we do some deep dive assessment and we find that there's several
contributions (all contrived for discussion): (1) during summer, sun sets
directly behind runway 28R, (2) lighting system activates at 1 hr before
sunset, (3) lighting system was refreshed with LED bulbs this year, (4)
taxiway C is 30% wider than median taxiway in US airports of size similar to
SFO, (5) the A320 (used by Air Canada 759) has reclining seats in the cockpit
and this pilot was shorter than the prior pilot for this plane.

If you had an assessment like that you could reasonably take action on some of
these without waiting for a fatal accident. The action wouldn't even
necessarily have to be to remove/replace/alter these things, it could even be
to commission a study to see the wider impact of LED lighting or reclining
seats or something. Changing the runway orientation is a very large expense,
but constraining 28R use during the critical sunset period is a little less
so.

If this pilot made the error, it stands to reason that other pilots may make
the same mistake. If we consider a near miss as seriously as we consider a
fatal accident we can still learn great things. A near miss is likely only a
failure of (N - 1) elements out of the critical N required for a fatal
accident.

------
cperciva
Can we have "might have triggered" changed to "could have triggered" in the
title?

~~~
milesf
Title is from the original article. What's your reason for could instead of
might?

~~~
mc32
The tense/mood is wrong. It implies it could have been the cause of something
that did happen rather than it having had a possibility of causing something
that did not happen.

Text of article has correct tense: "In what one aviation expert called a near-
miss of what _could have been_ the largest aviation disaster ever..."

~~~
StavrosK
That's exactly right, I parsed the title as "a great aviation disaster
happened, and the cause could be an SFO near miss".

~~~
jakub_g
Being non-native English speaker, I didn't notice the subtle distinction - but
it makes sense now with the explanations. Thanks for your comments.

------
phkahler
A different kind of error... I was returning from Las Vegas in the middle of
the day and the tower cleared us for departure on 9 and another plane on 27.
We had taxied out and then the pilot pulled over, turned around and waited for
the other plane to depart. He told us what had happened - there was a bit of
frustration in his voice. Imagine pulling up and seeing another plane sitting
at the opposite end of the runway ready to go. (it may not have been 9 and 27
I don't know which pair it was) Earlier waiting in the terminal I had seen a
different plane go around, but didn't know why. Apparently there was a noob in
the tower that day. This is why you look out the window and communicate.

------
lisper
Possible explanation for why this happened: it was night, and the parallel
runway 28L was closed and therefore unlit. The pilot may have mistaken 28R for
28L and hence the taxiway for 28R. This comes nowhere near excusing this
mistake (there is no excuse for a screwup of this magnitude) but it makes it a
little more understandable.

------
mikeash
I wonder just how likely this was to end in disaster. It feels overstated. The
pilot in question seemed to think something was wrong, he just hadn't figured
it out yet. I imagine he would have seen the aircraft on the taxiway in time
to go around on his own if he hadn't been warned off.

I'm having trouble figuring out the timeline. The recording in the article
makes it sound like this all happened in a matter of seconds, but it's edited
down to the highlights so that's misleading. LiveATC has an archived recording
of the event ([http://archive-server.liveatc.net/ksfo/KSFO-
Twr2-Jul-08-2017...](http://archive-server.liveatc.net/ksfo/KSFO-
Twr2-Jul-08-2017-0630Z.mp3), relevant part starts at about 14:45) but even
those appear to have silent parts edited out. (That recording covers a 30
minute period but is only about 18 minutes long.) In the archived recording,
about 40 seconds elapse between the plane being told to go around and the
"flew directly over us" call, but I don't know how much silence was edited out
in between.

Certainly this shouldn't have happened, but I wonder just how bad it actually
was.

------
blhack
People "could" run their cars off of bridges every day, but they don't because
they can see, and because roads have signs warning them of curves.

This sounds like a story of how well the aviation system works more than
anything. The pilot is in constant communication with the tower. The system
worked as intended here and he went around.

It seems like a non story.

~~~
dbroockman
Seems like disaster was only avoided because there was good visibility. If
there was fog that day, it sounds like this wouldn't have been avoided.

~~~
chrisper
If there is fog you do not fly by hand. You use an automated landing system
(ILS) in that case.

~~~
jiqiren
SFO's ILS isn't always functioning. It was turned off for months when Asiana
crashed (June 1st - Aug 2nd)[1].

[1] [http://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/a9124/what-went-
wrong...](http://www.popularmechanics.com/flight/a9124/what-went-wrong-in-
the-777-crash-in-san-francisco-15670446/)

~~~
mikeash
I'm pretty sure SFO always has functioning ILS, otherwise the airport would
have to close every time there was even mildly bad weather. Each runway has
its own system, though, so an individual runway's ILS can be turned off.

If there was fog, they wouldn't have been using 28L.

------
vermontdevil
Found a cockpit video of a landing approach to 28R to give you an idea
(daylight, good weather etc)

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0Y6GTI9pg4](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I0Y6GTI9pg4)

------
cmurf
Near as I can tell HIRL could not have been on, they were not following
another aicraft to land, and the runway and taxiway lighting must've been
sufficiently low that the taxi lights (low intensity version of a landing
light) on the queued up airplanes on the taxiway, made it look like the
taxiway was the runway. Pilot fatigue, and experience at this airport also are
questions.

[http://flightaware.com/resources/airport/SFO/IAP/ILS+RWY+28R...](http://flightaware.com/resources/airport/SFO/IAP/ILS+RWY+28R+\(CAT+II+-+III\)/pdf)

All runways have high intensity runway lighting (HIRL) and 28R has touchdown
zone and centerline lighting (TDZ/CL). Runway lights are white, taxiway lights
are blue. If you see these elements, there's no way to get confused. So my
assumption is the pilots, neither of them, saw this distinction.

HIRL is typically off for visual landings even at night. That's questionable
because night conditions are reduced visibility situations and in many other
countries night flying is considered as operating under instrument rules, but
not in the U.S. You do not need instrument rated aircraft or pilot
certification. For a long time I've though low intensity HIRL should be
enabled briefy in the case of visual night landings, where an aircraft is not
following behind another, at the time "runway in sight" verbal verification
happens between ATC and pilot.

------
rdtsc
Without knowing the cause but if I had to guess this looks like pilot error.
At least statistically that the leading cause of crashes.

I am surprised pilots still manually land planes. Is the auto-landing feature
not implemented well enough? But then it's relied upon in low visibility. So
it has to work, they why isn't it used more often?

~~~
woliveirajr
The point is that it doesn't help to know that it was a pilot error, because a
pilot is human, and humans in the same situation might make the same mistake -
and the main goal is to prevent accidents, not to have accidents happening all
the time and saying "it was again human error". It boils down to: 1 - Was the
"error" intentional? If so, how to prevent someone from doing it again? 2 -
Was it a real error, with no intention of any kind? If so, how to prevent that
someone makes it again?

~~~
rdtsc
> doesn't help to know that it was a pilot error, ... and the main goal is to
> prevent accidents,

You can't prevent accidents if you don't understand their cause. Saying well
we don't know what caused it but we'll just tighten all the screws a bit more
and send the pilots for more general training. It just doesn't work that way.

Everything is analyzed and tracked to discover the exact root cause. It can
often take many years and then new laws or guidelines are usually issued based
on findings.

------
mannykannot
AFAIK (not that I follow the issue closely) the problem of radio interference
that ended the last-chance attempt to prevent the Tenerife crash has not been
addressed [1]. If so, then it may be very fortunate that only one person
called out that the landing airplane had lined up its approach on the taxiway,
and not, for example, the crews of every airplane on the taxiway,
simultaneously.

[1]
[http://www.salon.com/2002/03/28/heterodyne/](http://www.salon.com/2002/03/28/heterodyne/)

TL;DR: At Tenerife, both the Pan-Am crew and the tower realized that the KLM
aircraft had started its take-off roll, and both tried to warn its crew at the
same time, but the resulting radio interference made the messages
unintelligible. The author states that a technical solution is feasible and
relatively easily implementable.

------
ryenus
This reminds me of the runway incursion incident at Shanghai, in Oct 2016:

[http://www.jacdec.de/2016/10/11/2016-10-11-china-
eastern-a32...](http://www.jacdec.de/2016/10/11/2016-10-11-china-
eastern-a320-and-a330-in-runway-incursion-at-shanghai/)

~~~
ryenus
tl;dr: the taking-off pilot took an immediate pull-up and avoided the
disaster.

------
radialbrain
The avherald article has a slightly more factual account of the event (with
links to the ATC recording):
[https://avherald.com/h?article=4ab79f58](https://avherald.com/h?article=4ab79f58)

------
URSpider94
Incidentally, I heard a story on KQED (SF Bay Area public radio) today that
mentioned a potential clue. There are two parallel runways on this heading --
however -- the left runway is closed for repairs and therefore is currently
unlit. If the pilot didn't remember this (it would have been included in his
briefings and approach charts for the flight, but he may not have internalized
it), he would likely have been looking for two parallel runways and would have
lined up on the right one, which in this case would have been the taxiway...

------
dba7dba
I'd like to suggest that if you are still interested in learning more about
what happened, you should look for a video from "VASAviation" on youtube. I'm
sure his subscribers have asked him already for analysis and he's working on
the video.

The channel focuses on aviation comms channel.

I find it informative because the youtube channel provides detailed
voice/video/photo/analysis of incidents (actual/close-calls) involving
planes/passengers taxing/landing/taking-off in/around airports.

------
briandear
I wonder why on 35R they wouldn’t have the taxiway to the left of the runway.
Then the “right” is always the runway. Same for the left. Basically have
parallel taxiways on the opposite side of the R/L designation of the runway.
So at SFO, the parallel taxiways would be inside the two runways.

However, approach lighting is pretty clear, but at dusk, I agree with another
comment that it can be rather hard to distinguish depending on angles. I think
that approach would be landing into setting sun, so that could have some
bearing.

------
4ad
It's not a near miss, it's a near hit.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDKdvTecYAM](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDKdvTecYAM)

------
exabrial
Wouldn't the word be "near hit" instead of "near Miss"? If you were close too
missing, you'd hit something...

~~~
mikeash
"Near miss" parses as "a miss which was near," not "nearly a miss."

I love George Carlin, bless his soul, but this is one thing he got wrong.

------
milesf
How is this even possible? Is it gross negligence on the part of the pilot, a
systems problem, or something else? (IANAP)

~~~
codeonfire
In Seattle, there have been taxiway landings in 2005 and 2015 because the
taxiway looks similar to the runways. Presumably the ILS system should align
them with the correct runway, but I guess that in these cases, ILS is not
being used. Even it it were, the runways are the same heading and just a few
hundred yards apart, so the mistake would not be realized until short final.

~~~
exDM69
Seattle-Tacoma has three parallel runways with unequal horizontal spacing,
it's easy to mistake that parallel taxiway between the center and right (north
approach) as the right runway.

I've only done it in flight simulators but it's really difficult to tell from
a distance.

------
heeen2
Aren't there lights that have to line up if you're on the right course for the
runway like with nautic harbors? Or warning lights that are visible when
you're not aligned correctly?

------
jjallen
Does anyone know just how close of a call this was? Was the landing aircraft
100, 200 meters above ground?

How many more seconds until they would have been too slow to pull up?

------
perseusprime11
How will an autonomous system handle this issue? Will it figure out the light
colors of runways vs. taxiways or will it rely close geolocation capabilities?

------
TrickyRick
> Off-Topic: Most stories about politics, or crime, or sports, unless they're
> evidence of some interesting new phenomenon. Videos of pratfalls or
> disasters, or cute animal pictures. If they'd cover it on TV news, it's
> probably off-topic. [1]

Is it just me or is this blatantly off-topic? Or is anything major happening
in the bay area automatically on-topic for Hacker News?

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
rkuykendall-com
There's something about air traffic that is very HackerNews. Search for "air
traffic" to see what I mean. Maybe it's something about coordinating big
complex systems, or maybe radio chatter is nerdy, I don't know, but it does
make sense to me.

~~~
TrickyRick
Maybe that's it then, still find it odd how the news that something almost
happened is related to HN. I would understand it if the investigation showed a
system failure or something similar.

------
martijn_himself
I get that this was a manual (non-ILS) landing, but why is there no audio
warning to indicate the aircraft is not lined up with the runway?

~~~
mrunkel
That audio warning is only available on the newest planes, but even if it is
available, if the ILS is off/not tuned in, there is no way for the plane to
know it's not lined up.

I can understand wanting to hand-fly the plane, but ILS should always be on
just as a reference/check.

I also think the linked article is making much to big a deal about this: * The
pilot checked in because he saw lights on the runway, he was probably very
close to aborting the landing anyway. * We don't know how far away the plane
was when the go-around command was given. * People overestimate how easy it is
to see the runway/airport at night. You only really get to see real resolution
when you're pretty close.

------
FiloSottile
I am just a passenger, but this looks very over-blown. A pilot aligned with
the taxiway, that's bad. But no pilot would ever land on a runway (or taxiway)
with 3 planes on it. Just search the Aviation Herald for "runway incursion".
And indeed, he spotted them, communicated, went around.

Aviation safety margins are so wide that this does not qualify as a near-miss.

~~~
csours
> Aviation safety margins are so wide that this does not qualify as a near-
> miss.

I think you have this kind of backwards here. If you were going in for an
amputation, and they only _prepped_ the wrong leg, would that not be a near
miss?

Rare incidents are hard to reason about and measure because they are so rare;
but there are things that lead up to rare events - like being on approach to
the wrong runway, that are less rare, and so they are easy to measure.

After you have plans and procedures to stop the actual rare disasters,
reducing near misses is the most effective way to stop disasters.

> But no pilot would ever land on a runway (or taxiway) with 3 planes on it.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenerife_airport_disaster)

~~~
FiloSottile
> After you have plans and procedures to stop the actual rare disasters,
> reducing near misses is the most effective way to stop disasters.

Oh, full +1. This is a bad incident that should result in an investigation and
maybe safety recommendations.

My point is that aviation has been at it for so long, that a "bad incident" is
very far removed from what the common interpretation of "near miss could have
triggered greatest disaster" (#1 on HN) would suggest to a random observer.

(And I think the author knew it, and went for clickbait.)

~~~
mnm1
Maybe, the author went for the clickbait, but only 584 people have to die for
this to be the worst airline disaster in history. With potentially five planes
involved, if he had crashed, I think that'd be highly likely in this
situation.

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kwhitefoot
Why is instrument landing not routinely done? Is it because it is not good
enough?

------
EGreg
Obligatory George Carlin

[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zDKdvTecYAM](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zDKdvTecYAM)

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leoharsha2
Reporting on disasters that didn't happen.

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BusinessInsider
Theoretically - if the plane had landed, how many planes would it have taken
out? It obviously wouldn't have been pretty, but I doubt the AirCanada would
have reached the fourth plane, or maybe even the third.

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TheSpecialist
I always wondered what about SFO makes it so much more dangerous than the
other airports in the area? It seems like they have a potential disaster every
couple years.

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stygiansonic
Wow, I landed on the next day on the same flight (AC 759)

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petre
Paint the runway and the taxiway in different colors and also use different
colors for the light signals that illuminate them at night. Blue/white is
rather confusing. Use clearly distinguishable colors such as red/blue or
orange/blue or magenta/yellow.

~~~
pluma
Another comment mentioned green vs white. Even though it's practically
impossible to get an aviation license with deuteranopia that just seems like
it's asking for trouble. White light is rarely pure white and depending on the
weather conditions I have a hard time believing the contrast is unambiguous.

Heck, maybe aviation should take a page from basic accessibility and figure
out that information should be conveyed more than one way. Don't rely on color
alone (and no, spacing of the rows of lights isn't unambiguous either,
especially when looking at varying distances and angles).

