Look Out for That Plane! Runway Collision Close Calls Are on the Rise
So many planes, so little runway space. (Thinkstock)
Did you ever think about the sheer number of flights and planes that take off and land at the same time at major airports around the country and wonder how more accidents don’t happen?
We hear about some – two within the last month: On October 22 two Delta Airlines planes sustained damage when they clipped wings after pushing off from the gate to depart from Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. Two weeks earlier on October 5 another Delta flight was clipped by a Royal Jordanian Airlines flight at John F. Kennedy International Airport in in New York City.
Well as it turns out, there are a substantial number of misses we just never hear about – until now.
USA Today analyzed the data from 2003 to 2013 and reports that near runway collisions of commercial planes at U.S. airports are up 64 percent over the last 10 years, to the tune of nearly one incident per day.
The figure is startling. But according to federal officials, there is some encouraging news: Of the 341 incidents reported in 2013, only six were deemed to be “at severe risk of a crash,” while the rest simply presented “a collision hazard,” according to the report.
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“We believe that the comprehensive, proactive safety management system we have put in place is reducing the level of risk on our nation’s runways,” said Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman Laura Brown.
It’s cold comfort to pilots, crew, and passengers involved in near misses. A passenger on the ill-fated October 22 Delta airlines takeoff described the experience, which luckily resulted in no injuries but caused hours of delays: “We were just on the runway, taxiing, and then all of the sudden, there was a big bump that we all felt. They wouldn’t tell us right away what happened, but everyone around me knew.”
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Watch: Increase In Close Calls and Runway Collisions
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