Aviation Appreciation Station v2

[Ryan Coke]

Double yikes. Listening to the audio gives me that sick feeling in my stomach, same as all the parties involved had I’m sure.

It is bad for the AA crew, but there are often other contributing factors. Taxi clearances in the states are often much more vague than in Canada, where they are very specific and precise. And as for having the runway already briefed and programmed, I believe LaGuardia (and certainly several other US airports) don’t give the departure runway until you get your taxi clearance. So it’s possible they had the other runway programmed and didn’t catch the change to plan. That’s always an annoyance when departing those airports, as it does create issues with preparation, then potentially having to configure for a different runway during the taxi.

Those things didn’t necessarily contribute, but just examples of issues that may have played a factor.

[BlackArcher101]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

It is bad for the AA crew, but there are often other contributing factors. Taxi clearances in the states are often much more vague than in Canada, where they are very specific and precise. And as for having the runway already briefed and programmed, I believe LaGuardia (and certainly several other US airports) don’t give the departure runway until you get your taxi clearance. So it’s possible they had the other runway programmed and didn’t catch the change to plan. That’s always an annoyance when departing those airports, as it does create issues with preparation, then potentially having to configure for a different runway during the taxi.

Those things didn’t necessarily contribute, but just examples of issues that may have played a factor.

Definitely can play a factor, I can't imagine how annoying it would be to get your runway assignment as part of the taxi instructions vs with your clearance. However, on this day they were running 4L departures all day and it should have been picked up by the pilots in the ATIS no? Is ATIS reviewed prior to taxi or is it prior to the clearance request?

I know prior to doing even my flight plan for VATSIM flights, I'm listening to ATIS to see which current runways are being used. I hate reprogramming a SID while taxiing.

[Flabbibulin]

I would proceed cautiously with this one, but it is being widely reported that there is facebook live footage from inside the cabin of the ATR 72 crash in Nepal yesterday- at the exact moment it happens... yikes.

[BlackArcher101]

Originally Posted by Flabbibulin

I would proceed cautiously with this one, but it is being widely reported that there is facebook live footage from inside the cabin of the ATR 72 crash in Nepal yesterday- at the exact moment it happens... yikes.

Have seen it. The audio is the worst part, don't recommend watching it.

[Manhattanboy]

In terms of dodged bullets I think you have to include that Air Canada incident in San Francisco a couple years ago when the pilot was about to land on a taxi way with airplanes lined up. He could have taken out a good part of the airport.

[timun]

Hmm, listening to the instructions I can kind of see how the American Airlines flight crew may have misunderstood instructions. It was also helpful for me to see the aerodrome chart to understand the context. In reality, they needed to turn right at a five-way intersection between taxiways A, B, J and K:

Spoiler!

I'm an aviation n00b, but not knowing exactly what the signage looks like at that taxiway fustercluck I can imagine if it wasn't signed very, very well it could seem very confusing to the flight crews. They were cleared to cross a runway, and instead of hanging a right at K they hung a right at J. If JFK ground control had said "American one-zero-six heavy turn right at Kilo and cross runway three-one-left" instead of the actually spoken "American one-zero-six heavy cross runway three-one-left at Kilo," it would have been more immediately obvious to me. Arguably they shouldn't have had to, because signage should have had a right arrow at taxiway K anyway, but just that extra little bit of context and I doubt this ever would have happened.

I find the ATC chatter interesting, insofar as about half the time I can't understand what the hell anyone is saying. I understand the need for expediency, as the air traffic controllers—or rather, ground control in particular—are super-busy. But everybody is so motormouthed that communications gets garbled super-easily. Maybe I'm just slow...

Spoiler!

All of this said, wouldn't there be a runway entrance light lit up to tell the American Airlines flight crew to stop...?

[Jethro Choicebro]

Originally Posted by timun

Hmm, listening to the instructions I can kind of see how the American Airlines flight crew may have misunderstood instructions. It was also helpful for me to see the aerodrome chart to understand the context. In reality, they needed to turn right at a five-way intersection between taxiways A, B, J and K:

Spoiler!

I'm an aviation n00b, but not knowing exactly what the signage looks like at that taxiway fustercluck I can imagine if it wasn't signed very, very well it could seem very confusing to the flight crews. They were cleared to cross a runway, and instead of hanging a right at K they hung a right at J. If JFK ground control had said "American one-zero-six heavy turn right at Kilo and cross runway three-one-left" instead of the actually spoken "American one-zero-six heavy cross runway three-one-left at Kilo," it would have been more immediately obvious to me. Arguably they shouldn't have had to, because signage should have had a right arrow at taxiway K anyway, but just that extra little bit of context and I doubt this ever would have happened.

I find the ATC chatter interesting, insofar as about half the time I can't understand what the hell anyone is saying. I understand the need for expediency, as the air traffic controllers—or rather, ground control in particular—are super-busy. But everybody is so motormouthed that communications gets garbled super-easily. Maybe I'm just slow...

Spoiler!

All of this said, wouldn't there be a runway entrance light lit up to tell the American Airlines flight crew to stop...?

Where its bad for them though is they were supposed to be taking of on 4L yet were heading down to 31L, so had they been going to the right runway they wouldn't have had any reason to cross at J.

[Ryan Coke]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

Definitely can play a factor, I can't imagine how annoying it would be to get your runway assignment as part of the taxi instructions vs with your clearance. However, on this day they were running 4L departures all day and it should have been picked up by the pilots in the ATIS no? Is ATIS reviewed prior to taxi or is it prior to the clearance request?

I know prior to doing even my flight plan for VATSIM flights, I'm listening to ATIS to see which current runways are being used. I hate reprogramming a SID while taxiing.

Totally, confusion on the departure runway may not have been a factor at all in this case, and I haven’t looked into the specifics here on this day.

Just a possibility that they were set up for one runway, and maybe they miss the runway change in the taxi instructions, and then continue on based on their flawed mental picture of what they are expecting. Even when they get the taxi clearance to cross a runway, they are expecting to cross the runway in their incorrect mental picture and then the different runway number just doesn’t register.

But again, not at all saying that’s what happened here, it is just as likely they were distracted and just kept taxiing straight instead of making the turn.

Having said that, a crew should ALWAYS confirm clear left and right whenever crossing a runway, active or not, as a last chance to trap a potentially catastrophic situation like this one. And I believe that is an almost universal procedure AFAIK, and it seems they didn’t do that adequately.

And you’re correct, the ATIS is reviewed prior to any setup or clearance request.

[BlackArcher101]

Originally Posted by timun

Hmm, listening to the instructions I can kind of see how the American Airlines flight crew may have misunderstood instructions. It was also helpful for me to see the aerodrome chart to understand the context. In reality, they needed to turn right at a five-way intersection between taxiways A, B, J and K:

Spoiler!

I'm an aviation n00b, but not knowing exactly what the signage looks like at that taxiway fustercluck I can imagine if it wasn't signed very, very well it could seem very confusing to the flight crews. They were cleared to cross a runway, and instead of hanging a right at K they hung a right at J. If JFK ground control had said "American one-zero-six heavy turn right at Kilo and cross runway three-one-left" instead of the actually spoken "American one-zero-six heavy cross runway three-one-left at Kilo," it would have been more immediately obvious to me. Arguably they shouldn't have had to, because signage should have had a right arrow at taxiway K anyway, but just that extra little bit of context and I doubt this ever would have happened.

I find the ATC chatter interesting, insofar as about half the time I can't understand what the hell anyone is saying. I understand the need for expediency, as the air traffic controllers—or rather, ground control in particular—are super-busy. But everybody is so motormouthed that communications gets garbled super-easily. Maybe I'm just slow...

Spoiler!

All of this said, wouldn't there be a runway entrance light lit up to tell the American Airlines flight crew to stop...?

In general it's pretty hard to mess that one up especially given the size of the plane and the dogleg they would have had to do to get onto Juliet from Bravo.

I tried to find better footage but this is the best I could find. This video shows the intersection and turn they should have taken. https://youtu.be/h9Tzxcw5eRI?t=1698

There are stop bars and I imagine wig-wag lights, but if they honestly thought they were cleared they would go through them. But as Ryan Coke mentions, regardless of clearance, they should be visually checking, and would have been hard to miss Delta starting it's roll.

[BlackArcher101]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

Totally, confusion on the departure runway may not have been a factor at all in this case, and I haven’t looked into the specifics here on this day.

Just a possibility that they were set up for one runway, and maybe they miss the runway change in the taxi instructions, and then continue on based on their flawed mental picture of what they are expecting. Even when they get the taxi clearance to cross a runway, they are expecting to cross the runway in their incorrect mental picture and then the different runway number just doesn’t register.

But again, not at all saying that’s what happened here, it is just as likely they were distracted and just kept taxiing straight instead of making the turn.

Having said that, a crew should ALWAYS confirm clear left and right whenever crossing a runway, active or not, as a last chance to trap a potentially catastrophic situation like this one. And I believe that is an almost universal procedure AFAIK, and it seems they didn’t do that adequately.

And you’re correct, the ATIS is reviewed prior to any setup or clearance request.

Ya, should be interesting to see the report, sadly they say it may take a year which is crazy in itself.

Actually wondering if they programmed 4R accidentally and that's where they were heading and ATC thought they were lining up for 31L, but actually intended on crossing it to continue down to 4R. However, I'm sure that runway is a tad short for the 777. Having the American on ground still as well didn't allow them to hear the takeoff clearance for Delta. That could have helped prevent it, but then they'd have to be handed off or told to monitor fairly earlier than usual.

[STeeLy]

Originally Posted by timun

Hmm, listening to the instructions I can kind of see how the American Airlines flight crew may have misunderstood instructions. It was also helpful for me to see the aerodrome chart to understand the context. In reality, they needed to turn right at a five-way intersection between taxiways A, B, J and K:

Spoiler!

I'm an aviation n00b, but not knowing exactly what the signage looks like at that taxiway fustercluck I can imagine if it wasn't signed very, very well it could seem very confusing to the flight crews. They were cleared to cross a runway, and instead of hanging a right at K they hung a right at J. If JFK ground control had said "American one-zero-six heavy turn right at Kilo and cross runway three-one-left" instead of the actually spoken "American one-zero-six heavy cross runway three-one-left at Kilo," it would have been more immediately obvious to me. Arguably they shouldn't have had to, because signage should have had a right arrow at taxiway K anyway, but just that extra little bit of context and I doubt this ever would have happened.

I find the ATC chatter interesting, insofar as about half the time I can't understand what the hell anyone is saying. I understand the need for expediency, as the air traffic controllers—or rather, ground control in particular—are super-busy. But everybody is so motormouthed that communications gets garbled super-easily. Maybe I'm just slow...

Spoiler!

All of this said, wouldn't there be a runway entrance light lit up to tell the American Airlines flight crew to stop...?

Ground Controllers are still licensed Air Traffic Controllers. As far as I know, every tower that has multiple controllers on at the same time, controllers rotate positions and work ground and tower (air) on the same shift.


With JFK being an American hub, controllers would expect an AA pilot to know the airfield quite well, so it is very likely that the controllers don't feel the need to say "Taxi right Kilo, cross runway 31L". Also, since Bravo continues, it would also be a "right" turn onto TWY J, so the outcome might have been the same even if the controller started them off with a right turn.



As for ATC audio quality, the radios on the planes and the tower are much much better than the radios people are using to capture for sites like LiveATC. Controllers (and pilots) do talk fast, but it's not too bad once you get the hang of it.

[STeeLy]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

Ya, should be interesting to see the report, sadly they say it may take a year which is crazy in itself.

Actually wondering if they programmed 4R accidentally and that's where they were heading and ATC thought they were lining up for 31L, but actually intended on crossing it to continue down to 4R. However, I'm sure that runway is a tad short for the 777. Having the American on ground still as well didn't allow them to hear the takeoff clearance for Delta. That could have helped prevent it, but then they'd have to be handed off or told to monitor fairly earlier than usual.

I would agree that 4R might be on the shorter side for a 777. I do wonder if they might have asked for departure off 31L earlier before the taxi clearance and thought they were getting it. To get to 4R and go full length 31L, you would have to cross 4L, so the possibility is definitely there. I think even if they heard the T/O clearance for Delta off 4L, this still might have happened as there is still a chance they think they're crossing 31L. At the end of the audio, the AA pilot asked ground whether the last clearance they were given was the clearance to cross a runway. The pilot didn't say which runway they were cleared to cross.

The possibilities of what caused this situation to happen are pretty much endless. A lot of things had already went wrong for this to happen, it'll be interesting to see what the findings actually are.

[Ryan Coke]

CVR data from the 777 would be interesting. But seeing as how they continued to destination, they may not have it. I’m not sure exactly what the recording time on the 777 CVR is, but it may be only 2 hours.

[Bigtime]

Originally Posted by Ryan Coke

CVR data from the 777 would be interesting. But seeing as how they continued to destination, they may not have it. I’m not sure exactly what the recording time on the 777 CVR is, but it may be only 2 hours.

Good point, and yet another question as to why did they continue on to London. I'm assuming AA Operations told them to do so?

[Lubicon]

AA106 should have caught it, the two taxiways are clearly marked with which runway they are intersecting. That said, from a

Post #9 in the link below also has a good diagram of what should have happened vs what actually happened. They missed the turn to Kilo but the turn onto Juliet is probably less than another 30-45° of turn and is the next taxiway immediately after Kilo in the direction they were travelling.

Let's assume they had briefed it correctly. In their minds they had a mental picture of a right hand turn and immediately a runway crossing - that is what they expected to see with their clearance. And that is exactly what their wrong turn also provided to their eyes visually - a right hand turn with an immediate runway crossing. So they saw exactly what they expected to see, but they did not notice it was a different runway. That is not excusable but I can certainly see that as a contributing factor. Our brains/eyes are conditioned to process and interpret things partially on what we expect to see and not necessarily what we actually see. I think that may have played a factor here.

https://www.pprune.org/accidents-clo...-jan-23-a.html

[timun]

^Basically what I was trying to say earlier.^

Originally Posted by Jethro Choicebro

Where its bad for them though is they were supposed to be taking of on 4L yet were heading down to 31L, so had they been going to the right runway they wouldn't have had any reason to cross at J.

Hmm, yeah I hadn't really considered that: there's no reason to go down J unless you're taking off from 31L, and there's no way to get to 4L except taxiway K...

[Ryan Coke]

Originally Posted by Bigtime

Good point, and yet another question as to why did they continue on to London. I'm assuming AA Operations told them to do so?

You know, when something like this happens, it can take some time to really grasp how ‘big’ the event was. Mistakes happen, and taxi errors are not unusual. There was no aircraft damaged, nobody was injured, and the ‘mission’ is to get the planeload of people to their destination. There was also likely uncertainty of whose fault it was. If the AA crew thought the controller had screwed up, then why wouldn’t they continue?

In hindsight we can look and say this was nearly catastrophic, why did they depart. But in the moment everyone involved is trying to process it….the crews of both planes, and the controllers.

The other crew that rejected may well have had the more dramatic experience. There are also issues with a (relatively) high speed reject that require some time to deal with (brake temperatures), so combined I can see why they were more likely to end up calling it a day after that.

But I think we can all relate to having a job to do, and even when something abnormal happens, we feel compelled to complete the original goal.

[KelVarnsen]

An Yeti Airlines ATR 72 crashed in Nepal on Sunday. The co-pilot of the flight lost her husband in a crash in 2006.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/plane-...rash-1.6715095

[Lubicon]

Sunwing cancelling more winter flights out of Saskatchewan. This in addition to the 'temporary' suspension of flights earlier this month.

https://www.ckom.com/2023/01/18/sask...ng-next-month/

https://globalnews.ca/news/9416140/s...ht-operations/

[Acey]

Originally Posted by timun

I find the ATC chatter interesting, insofar as about half the time I can't understand what the hell anyone is saying. I understand the need for expediency, as the air traffic controllers—or rather, ground control in particular—are super-busy. But everybody is so motormouthed that communications gets garbled super-easily. Maybe I'm just slow...

On the scale of intelligibility of ATC communications, these communications are very understandable.

It's easy to speak more quickly when you're expecting a certain sequence of words or phrases.