Thankfully, the 379 people on the Airbus 350 survived. Unfortunately, 5 of the six people in the coast guard plane were killed.
CCTV Video from the airport shows the stunning moment that JAL flight 516 hits the coast guard plane. It is remarkable that more people were not hurt.
Jan. 2 (UPI) — Five people were killed Tuesday after an incoming Japan Airlines Airbus A350 collided with a Japan Coast Guard aircraft on the runway as it touched down at Tokyo’s Haneda International Airport, authorities said.
All 367 passengers and 12 crew of JAL Flight 516 from Sapporo on Hokkaido escaped without serious injury after the aircraft erupted in a fireball, but police confirmed five of the six crew aboard the Coast Guard plane delivering aid to the earthquake-struck region of Ishikawa were killed.
The Transport Ministry said the 379 passengers and crew aboard JAL’s plane escaped the flames via the Airbus’ emergency slides, but only the captain of the Coast Guard’s Canadian-built Bombardier DHC8-300 survived. He was seriously injured.
Video footage and photos posted online of the 5:30 p.m. crash show the Airbus appearing to burst into flames as it touched down and careened down the runway ablaze.
“I felt a bump, like the aircraft was colliding with something when touching down. I saw a spark outside the window and the cabin was filled with gas and smoke,” a passenger aboard the JAL flight told Kyodo News.
The crash caused airport authorities to shut all four runways at Haneda, which remained closed late Tuesday.
Prime Minister Fumio Kishida ordered officials to launch an urgent investigation into the collision while pledging to provide information about the accident to the public in a timely manner. (more)
Amazing job by the crew!! 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻
Important also to note … I saw a video from inside the airliner as the crash took place. The News narrator said there was PANIC inside the plane!! Panic!!! The video proved just the opposite. There was NO panic inside the plane. I didn’t see a single passenger leap up and start clogging the aisles.
I will assume the crew did a good job of evacuating the airliner … but even MORE importantly … the passengers didn’t panic and start falling all over themselves. And THAT makes all the difference. I hate to say it … but I don’t expect such orderly behavior from the typical US passenger plane.
Wow important update thank you
Exactly what I was thinking. If that happened here, 3 purple haired AFWL’s, a couple Karen’s and a Sheneequa would all be in the aisle trying to get their steamer trunks out of the overhead storage first.
or mowing down other people to get to the exit … funny
How could anyone get off a plane that was on fire? Did the video show fire inside or was it just the outside of the plane?
All those people evacuating and surviving is wonderful, but it seems like a real miracle.
The fire was outside. Fairly light smoke on the inside … that was all from the interior video I saw. The fire was certainly raging outside though … mostly at the point of impact. I presume the wing tank was on fire.
I could be wrong, but my guess is that there are no Japanese equivalents of “AAL To Colorado Springs — MMA Fighter vs. Dog-Toting Travel Karen” videos on GoogleTube…
Very important point about the lack of panic.
Except they hit another plane and 8 of the 9 people on board were killed. So there is that.
5/6
My God, what an inferno! We are losing the ability to maintain and operate our overly complex systems at a frightening pace.
Here in the US, the quality of personnel in both the air traffic control community and in the pilot community, in both commercial aviation and in general aviation, has deteriorated markedly in the last four years. It’s only a matter of time before a collision like this one happens in the US as a consequence of an ATC error, a pilot error, or some combination of each.
Covid and the mandates had a lot to do with it
As did the implementation of DEI ideology. Hiring people based on skin color instead of competency and ability to do the job. Imagine thousands of people, like the former Harvard president, in the control towers at airports or piloting airplanes. Putting lives in the hands of unqualified imbeciles.
What do you call your doctor who graduated at the bottom of his class?
“Doctor”.
Ha ha ha ha ha! Aggiegirl that’s very good, may I borrow it?
What do you call a Doctor who left a sponge inside you after surgery? Doctor, no longer covered by malpractice insurance
He he, that’s an old one. What do you call someone who graduates but doesn’t pass the licensing board? Doctor that doesn’t get to practice. ;p
So Japan is DEI warped?
Ok…got it. Taking shots at US institutions.
Carry on!
I remember Sully doing a masterful job landing a bird in the Hudson River!
Exactly!..during the Obama administration they stopped giving hiring preference to military personnel to advance the DEI objectives. It’s crazy to think that we spend years and vast sums of money to train our military air traffic controllers and just flush all that experience down the toilet. I know this firsthand, my son served 5 years in the USMC as an ATC and now he pushes carts at Costco. He only knows of one his former teammates that went on to get hired by the FAA after exiting the service.
That is insane.
Surely more than DEI efforts.
More like DIE, selecting against competence and virtue, AntiNational Darwinism.
Zero the Destroyer.
DEI has a lot more to do with it.
Unqualified people are being promoted to run country.
Jobamma & his consiglieres INTENTIONALLY hired incompetent over competent, in their push to destroy our country.
This statement is actually true for all industries and verticals where the vax mandate was instituted. The doers all said “forget that” and retired or quit. It left at the helms a bunch of lessers (being real).
Without getting too personal we had some experience with doctors and nurses towards the end of 2023. They are no longer reliable or trust worthy for feedback and assistance. You are required to be on the ball monitoring, questioning and rejecting their guidance. It was actually quite disgusting to experience.
As for airline travel I will not even step foot into an airport anymore.
This accident was clearly pilot error (or possibly but less likely control tower error).
all true. in just about every aspect of life. thankful to find anchor in our tree home.
We trust doctors and Healthcare 100%
Only in Mexico
Yiu can’t say it’s clearly pilot error . either it’s pilot or control error , we don’t know but I would think its most likely a control error
I suspect it will occur due to a terror attack or cheap and substandard aircraft maintenance.. As Alway the later will be blamed on pilot error, always the low hanging fruit..
It is plainly obvious the incident is a direct consequence of either pilot error or ATC error, or some combination of the two. Here in the US, we have seen an increasing number of close calls in the last several years which could have resulted in a collision and fire just like the one that happened in Japan. It’s only a matter of time before it happens at a US airport.
It’s been deteriorating a lot longer than that!
So far…luck has been with us in terms of major aviation accident rates. Which is a good thing.
YES! And currently we are on track to lose more air traffic controllers than we can replace in the next couple of years.
Our towers, TRACONs, and ARTCCs are dangerously understaffed already, and the DEI governmental hiring policies are not resulting in the best hires for these positions.
It’s a recipe for disaster!
Not only not the best hires.
The worst hires.
Only.
No. We are not losing ability. The aviation industry is one of the most complex systems that humans have created. Add to that the shear size of this system, the volume of people transported safely on a daily basis, and we can begin to appreciate the skill sets of those involved. It is, however, a system made by humans that are not perfect. And the machines we build are not perfect either. Unfortunately, accidents happen. People make mistakes, and machines do break. What we have witnessed here is a testament to the dedicated professionals in the aviation industry with their ability to address an accident and save as much life as possible in an otherwise terrible set of circumstances.
With all due respect. Although this crew did an amazing job, given the impact of intentionally hiring incompetent personnel and maligning excellence, we have nowhere to go but down. MAGA!!
A point on that, Jeff, what if this is just the result of a tired person? Yeah, ATC people are good at what they do, but people get tired. and the Japanese tend to overwork the employees. Have you ever read the story of the two planes at Tenerife? Might be something to consider while discussing this.
You are so right saying “overly complex” systems. People make fun of the old TV sets with three dials – on/off, volume, and channel. Now I can’t even figure out how to turn on a TV in a hotel room. It is absurd and totally unnecessary.
RIP to the lost coast guard crew and God bless their families. It is testament to engineering and flight crew training for being able to save everyone’s lives on the commercial flight. Prayers for our fellow humans of Japan.
That was indeed miraculous!
“runway incursion” = failure of aircraft crew and/or tower to communicate and comply with aircraft separation rules either in landing, take off or taxi/parking phases”
this is unusual for Japan, as it maintains some of the best aircraft safety records and has some of the lowest runway incursion incident rates. No conspiracy theory suggested, only to note the far higher rate of runway incursions that occur in the US and europe..which is more or less related to higher traffic density and lower standard and qualifications for pilots and tower controllers.
noting: tcas is not useful for aircraft on the ground. some aircraft have a ground mode/standby mode for TCAS, but real world there are so many false positives in a dense airport with many moving aircraft, that most pilots simply turn it off and only use transponder. Only arming tcas just prior to takeoff. In this case, the landing aircraft was likely transmitting tcas, but the runway taxi/park aircraft was not. This means the ONLY means to detect a collission course was direct pilot to pilot communication AND/OR Tower communications, and tower controllers have the ultimate responsibility to direct safe runway traffic communication and direction. At this point, I am inclined to believe the tower failed to communicate and verify ground aircraft position. Of course, it is also possible the ground aircraft may have not obeyed the tower directions. At this point, there are too many unknowns to make a clear preliminary finding. I only post this information to lay out what is most likely going to be the root cause. It may be more than one root cause.
not a good day for aviation safety. God Bless the Japanese Coast Guard
God Bless America
So was this an AI event where the aircraft were interfered with? I don’t trust any event these days. Always assuming something nefarious occurred. Always the skeptic.
Probably not; too high a probability that human error was the primary culprit. Since the JAL airliner was on a landing flight path for several minutes before this incident, the error has to be in local traffic control or the CG aircraft crew which may possibly be younger and less experienced.
Since an aircraft on the ground may not be able to back up unless it has reverse thrusters (jet engines) or variable pitch props, the CG aircraft should have been held clear from the runway intersection until the A350 had touched down and passed by. Even if/when they realized they had gone too far, they were helpless without a tow tractor to pull them back, which was not possible within a minute.
The Coast Guard plane was a Dash 8, registration JA722A. That’s a twin engine high wing turboprop. I’ve flown the type numerous times on Alaska Air (Horizon) in the past. I believe that was the type Richard Russell stole off the ramp at SeaTac and did aerobatics with before purposely crashing the aircraft and killing himself.
I believe the JAL A350 is the first A350 hull loss. Glad everyone got out. RIP to the Coast Guard personnel.
Reversible pitch props?
All turboprops have pitch control blades, so I presume reverse capability is likely a universal capacity.
Nevertheless, the runway intruding pilot may not have recognized he violated the line, or may have decided it was insignificant or otherwise chose not to address or reveal the violation, we don’t even really yet know if he actually made an effort to hold at the line at all.
I did some research but couldn’t find any more information than what has already been reported.
I’ve read in several different sources that the covid vaxx causes neurological damage in more people than has been reported by the media. People’s cognitive abilities are impaired at random times. Medical experts who are against the vaxx apparently have no doubts that this has caused and continues to cause many unusual accidents.
Vaxidents have consequences.
I am not certain I understand the question wrt “AI”. but will only comment to a known issue with gps interference (ATWAS & TCAS systems both use GPS technologies), as well as the ADS-B systems which are plain text and unencrypted. While there are no known (officially reported) instances of hacking gps for commercial airliners (it’s definitely something that is happening in the war in Ukraine and I remember reading some uncorroborated rumors about drones flying around heathrow, apparently equipped with gps jamming capability), the potential exists to cause serious problems in and around airports where high density traffic depends on 100 percent stable radio based systems. One chink in the system can cause brief, intermittent problems and consequently the fast moving pace of flight phases at airports makes these even temporary intermittent “soft faults” very problematic. While I will presume this risk has not been demonstrated “in the wild”, it is a known threat risk. What you find is that it is very difficult to determine if there is a malign effort to interfere versus regions where gps interference just happens normally..There is also the issue of interference with the 5G bandwidth that has and continues to be controversial. I am not sure how japan settled on the issue of allowing 5G cell towers near airports, but I suspect they did not follow the idiotic and unsafe steps that the FAA/FCC and major airlines and cell providers decided upon. *yes, 5G signals can and do interfere with many kind of MMR antennas on aircraft.
Having stated these things, it is important to recognize that these systems are NOT primary means for coordinating safe landing, take off and taxi/parking phases of flight. The PRIMARY means is proper and immediate positive communications directed from the tower to all aircraft.. All the technology in the world cannot provide better than a human being in the tower, who has command over the traffic/air space they are responsible for to know exactly where everything is, where it should be and to know what to do when things get uncoordinated.
a friend sez it this way: the job of the air traffic controller is to make order out of chaos.
God Bless America
That is exactly why I don’t fly anymore.
and never will
I just tell myself it’s safer than driving 🙄
No. Visual flight conditions and 4 pilots in the cockpit. They would likely be manually flying at this point, and even if autoland had plenty of time and good visibility to take over.
always!!
Yup. Same thoughts.
Anything electronic can be hacked nowadays and will usually leave no trail for investigators.
Communications could have been hacked where a crew doesn’t hear the correct tower instructions? Plane controls hacked? Tower/radar hacked? Who knows. They will never tell us the truth.
So many possibilities that all lead usually to China. Lol.
for more descriptions
https://termaviation.com/what-is-atsaw-in-aviation/
Wholeheartedly agree, especially for Japan. Sounds like the CG aircraft was either lining up for takeoff and/or it was waiting too close to the main runway and got clipped by the JAL aircraft when landing.
Japan already had a couple bad events this year (quake). Let’s hope it smooths out for them.
Hi treepers. 40 year int’l airline pilot here with some technical details.:
1) Regitiger is right – this was a runway incursion. All airports have taxiway markings and all important “hold short” lines. The hold short lines are painted on the taxiways which are perpendicular to the runway. Having even a few inches of your nose over the ‘hold short’ line is a runway incursion. Big problem for years with industry, ICAO, FAA, JAA, manufacturers all working together to address it.
2) In low visibility weather (which this was not as evidenced by the clear video) there are lighted ‘hold short’ lines in the taxiways. If installed, they would not have been operating in this weather.
3) Problem is that certain widebody aircraft are … pretty wide. Some airports which service the A380 for example have special taxiways and hold short lines which are essentially, extra far back from the runway to provide clearance from the longer hanging out wing.
4) The whole system counts on the waiting aircraft ensuring that his entire airplane is actually behind the hold short line, and also that the landing widebody airplane lands exactly on the centerline.
5) If Coast Guard realized their nose went over the line they had a duty to report — ATC would then tell landing aircraft to go around, and taxi the ground aircraft across the runway to a different place. (There is no reverse).
6) If landing aircraft with 2 pilots and 2 relief crew in cockpit for landing realized that they were not exactly on centerline, they should have gone around. With Crew Resource Management (CRM )training, any crewmember should call out the discrepancy and call for the missed approach. In reality, it doesn’t always happen. One major US carrier looked at the FOQA data — that’s the fancy sensors that tell you everything about what the airplane is actually doing — ‘pings. etc. — and discovered that of the airplane which exceeded safe landing parameters (too high, too fast, not lined up, sinking too fast, etc.) that only 3% actually go around.
7) Absolutely shocking this happened in Japan. Their safety record is the best, and they are very thorough.
8) Watched the videos carefully. The one thing I can predict with confidence: fatigue will be found to be a factor in this accident.
Thank you for your insight 👊🏻
FATIGUE – AGREED
#1 REASON FOR STANDARD PROCEDURES and NO DEVIATIONS FROM –> STANDARD PROCEDURES
Aviation Incidences Occur BECAUSE OF ” The LAW of THREE s ” –
3 MISTAKES ( DEVIATIONS from SOP ) = Incident / Accident / Crash
AVIATE, NAVIGATE, COMMUNICATE
( by THE GRACE Of GOD and that ” He SMILES on THOSE THAT SAVES OTHERS “, i CAN See Old Age )
Yes, I am not sure that Haneda adopted the Autonomous Runway Incursion Warning System that FAA approved. To be fair, not all airports in the US have this technology either. It’s expensive and is just another layer of safety that pilots and controllers can depend on for collision avoidance.
it would be interesting to know if Haneda (certainly one of the high density airports in the world, with many cutting edge proven technologies installed), has something like the ARIWS equivalent. it’s basically a ground radar combined with ground sensors…concentrated on a automated system. Some call it the “stop light” system for aircraft.
example: you are on taxi and see a red light illuminate. YOU IMMEDIATELY BRAKE AND COME TO A COMPLETE HALT. In this way, the pilot takes his cues on taxi and landing (and takeoff) from a series of well positioned signalling systems. This was adopted because of the weaknesses in relying solely on the judgement of controllers and direct pilot to pilot communication and that fact that tcas technology on the ground in high density aircraft regimes makes it unreliable to make moment to moment decisions where distances and times of less than 30 feet and 10 seconds can mean the difference between making it home or making the paper.
No. 8
…a (llllonnnggg) day after an earthquake,
which no doubt is relatively challenging for people to alertly address / help those directly, or indirectly engaged in helping others (whether it be on foot, bicycle, taxi, car, train, plane, boat etc).
As such, renewed efforts have likely gone into affect to step up the alertness.
p.s.
Not related, different, and not an excuse:
There are a lot roadway/ street injuries and fatalities,
and whole lot more unreported near misses. (largely because imperfect humans and human made technologies are involved, plus the speed of vehicles.)
We had an incident here at PHNL (Honolulu) recently. RWY 4L and 4R are very close together. Larger aircraft use 4R. The hold short lines between 4R and 4L are such that the hold short for 4L is closest to 4R, while the second one by 4L is actually the hold short for 4R for aircraft coming the other way. Out of town pilot landing 4R mistakenly held short at the second (wrong) line. Local pilot on 4L (freight dog) realized what was wrong so no close call or anything.
A lot of speculation that CG plane was involved in earthquake response, may had been a factor.
Nice summary.
Ever watch the Smithsonian Channel program Air Disasters? There was one episode in which the aircrew became scope locked on other issues and mistook a duty runway for a taxiway.
My initial reaction was this was ultimately an ATC/Ground Control caused problem. But aircrew situational awareness (lack thereof) is clearly a possibility.
ATC/Ground controller cannot see if holding short aircraft on the taxiway has a nose over the hold short line.
There are no cameras or sensors out there — yet. Working on next technology for low vis operations
Well…as a retired Naval Aviator…I would classify that as pilot error!
If interested in near real time commentary from an active B777 pilot (united, and former US Navy Aviator), you can’t find another more informed and diligent accident assessment expert. “blanco”. Blancolirio. I watch his stuff regularly because he is willing to get into the details that matter, context, and also relevant type aircraft history points. https://www.youtube.com/@blancolirio
here is his video about this runway incursion.
Good analysis.
He notes the damage to the nose cone and the pattern of damage to both engine nacelles of the AB350 seem to suggest that the -8 was actually on the runway and lined up for takeoff, the landing jet’s nose cone striking the t-tail of the -8 and the engine nacelles striking it’s wings.
The nose gear was either ripped off in the collision or otherwise failed, further suggesting much more than a glancing blow occurred, but a solid hit on a jet right on the runway.
He replayed the hard to discern English instruction to the -8 to proceed to that particular taxiway but noted he couldn’t hear an instruction to “hold short” of the runway, nor did he hear a call-back repeating the instruction as confirmation.
Very worthy video, remember this guy from the 737MAX affair, credible and cautious in his speculations.
Excellent analysis. He is right — very sharp work by the crew to look out the door at 2 Right, see the burning engine and redirect people to the forward exit at 1 right. The FA at the doors behind the engine on the right side did the same thing. This is quality training and consistent drilling on emergency procedures at its finest.
The evidence does seem compelling that the coast guard aircraft was on the runway.
Listening to the tape gives me goosebumps and an involuntary shudder. “Failure to use correct ATC phraseology” will kill you every time. There are only 2 things you do at a runway: “Hold Short” or “Line Up and Wait” [on the runway, for takeoff clearance] This controller did not state either one. It appears as though the crew interpreted it as meaning to “Line Up and Wait”. Their readback is missing from the tape or it was not made. Could have been distracted. Another reason why we do not read [pre-departure] checklists while taxiing – lest we miss an ATC call. If he had read back what he thought he heard, that would have been an opportunity for the controller to catch the miscomm and correct it with what he meant. Another corner cut. 99% of the time if you skip a verification procedure it doesn’t matter.
Do it every day and skipping the redundancy becomes normal “Normalcy of Deviation [from SOP]” Until it blows up in your face and you remember that absolutely every sentence in that rule book, be it government, industry, manufacturer, or regulation is written in blood.
The industry has been moving towards technology for written clearances for some years now. ATC sends clearance to cockpit printer. Cockpit writes back what they think they received. ATC writes back that cockpit read it back correctly. Then and only then cockpit acts on the clearance.
This has been in effect for long range clearances over oceanic or remote regions for some time (ETOPS), and in some locations for ground ops as well — particularly important in low visibility environments where we operate large in airplanes in such dense fog that you literally cannot see more than a few feet down the runway.
Expect an international push to move forward with implementing the technologies. Also expect a slowdown and political battle. If you tried that at say, La Guardia, you would have to cut your daily traffic in half.
I work at an airport , majority of planes are fueled in the wings .
Either way , amazing more people didn’t perish .
Don’t they fly with a minimum safety margin of fuel (not full tanks) to keep the weight down? Mostly empty tanks probably helped.
Mostly empty tanks actually make a bigger fireball (more oxygen in the tank to mix with the fuel vapor). A full fuel tank may rupture and burn, but is very unlikely to explode because there’s not enough O2 in the vapor mix.
Combustion is a funny thing and sometimes has counter-intuitive results. Just remember the fire triangle, you not only need heat and fuel, you need sufficient oxygen.
In a confined space, you have a Lower Explosive Limit and an Upper Explosive Limit (concentration of fuel vapors). Going back to my old days as a ship repair locker officer for Repair 5 (main propulsion) and later Damage Control Officer (head firefighter).
That anyone survived on the airbus, is truly miraculous.
Ninety seconds, and every person on the Airbus was on the tarmac. That’s a miracle, and hopefully stands as a portent of more good outcomes in this new year.
All commercial aircraft (Boeing and Airbus) go through evacuation demonstrations for certification. Crew must demonstrate they can evacuate people within 90 seconds. After that the toxic smoke will get you and it is non-negotiable. Of course the demo pax are all able bodied employees who are sitting in a parked airplane ready for the drill. That determines the max number of allowable seats and crew (Souls On Board) SOB for airworthiness certification.
This crew – pilots and flight attendants did one HELL of a good job. Keep in mind with the fire already burning on one side of the airplane prior to its coming to a rest that half of the exits were unusable. I am impressed !
I am as well, and suspect the credit goes as well to the Japanese passengers themselves.
A self-respecting well-comported populace makes a difference in all things.
your last sentence resonates in so MANY WAYS
Have seen many YT vids of other incidents pax evacuating down the slides with all their carry-on crap with them.
“I felt a bump ….when touching down…. I saw a spark outside….cabin filled with smoke.”
Sabotage
When you land on top of a Dash-3, I guess you feel a bump alright.
The western world is completely falling apart.
But I guess as long as we have DEI….
More fortunate than Tenerife. Still the worst airplane disaster ever. Probably never to be surpassed.
Let’s pray that it never is surpassed.
Quite true, yes. The numerous “little” decisions, situations, weather, small substitute airport, language, static, over/cross talk, etc for all of that to meet at that moment in time and space.
Yep, a family friend and schoolmate I spent many dinners with when young lost both parents and an aunt in that one. They were on the Pan Am. Cast a pretty dark pal on our local church and community.
Japan has an excellent aviation safety record. First the earthquake and now this. God be with them.
At Tenereife the Pan Am flight attendants, who had been told to expect a long long delay, were in their ‘huddle’ together in the forward galley, discussing how they would do a light snack service with beverages to take care of people for the delay they were told to expect of at least 2 hours.
As a result, when KLM came smashing into them, they were not at their jumpseats to quickly open the door, pop the slide. and start pushing people down while shouting “jump, jump”.
A lot of changes in the industry after that accident, including strict adherence to rule that flight attendants MUST be at their stations during taxi. This turns into a problem when cantankerous pax create a fuss during long delay — and why the FAs simply do not want to deal with it while the airplane is still on an active taxiway with the SEAT BELT ON sign illuminated. We all remember Tenereife, and every pilot and flight attendant sitting in the cabin of an airliner has it somewhere in the back of their head where the exit is, which way the handle turns (in the smoke filled dark cabin) and how to get the heck out.
As a military and civilian pilot, I was always taught and told the pilot in command had final responsibility and control of any situation in regards to safety. A number of times I had to overrule the air traffic controller’s decision or I wouldn’t be typing this today.
It appears to me the Coast Guard aircraft pilot in command was ultimately at fault. It doesn’t mean the air traffic controller was not a contributing factor. But it does mean the pilot was the final screw-up.
it Will Be Interesting IF they Release the Audio Tapes from the Tower ( Local Control – AIR & RUNWAYS )
and the Ground Controller ( Taxiways and Ramps ) …
Tapes are out. They are speaking broken English. Standard is Aviation English.
THANK YOU SIR ! Have to Research it
from avherald.com
https://avherald.com/h?article=5132b9fe
MORE INFO
Experienced a SIMILAR Situation in my career doing PAR NIGHT APPROACHES in our C-130 out of Elizabeth City, NC. The ATC Staff with Oceana was VERY GRACIOUS by Allowing us to ” violate ” their Normal Routine of recovering their gaggle of
” Turkeys ” ( F-14 s ) from the Various Ranges. They assigned and TOLD us that they had a TRAINING CONTROLLER working with a Supervisor and They gave us an Extended Approach pattern that allowed ALL to Get Training Time and ALLOWED for an Acceptable Interval for the Jet Traffic to Land or Enter into Sequence.
SAVE 1 F-14 that the TOWER INSERTED Without telling PAR or us IN THE C-130 !
i ANNOUNCED IT to OUR PILOTS as i SAW THE WHITE TAIL NAV LIGHT SLIDE IN FRONT of OUR WINDSCREEN within a 1 / 4 Mile on SHORT FINAL;
my perception without Landing Lights or other References except for the Tail Position Light on the F-14 , the COAST GUARD DOES NOT NORMALLY FLY in FORMATIONS – CLOSE or ” LOOSE “…
WE DEPARTED the Pattern after the GO AROUND and went Back to OUR Humble Home Base.
TOWER was on a DIFFERENT FREQ and DID NOT INFO APPROACH ( sounds like the SAME HERE )
https://www.aeroinside.com/19008/jal-a359-at-tokyo-on-jan-2nd-2024-collided-with-coast-guard-dh8c-on-runway-and-burst-into-flames
Very interesting point Quinn ! I will have to go listen to the tapes — I haven’t had a chance yet. SOP is for the taxiing airplane to call tower when told or approaching the active runway, and I cannot remember a time in which I was not advised to contact tower when holding short and ready for takeoff.
BUT what do we know about the coast guard airplane ? I read something that they had just come in from a flight. Which means they would be taxiing to their parking space and holding short of an active runway to get there. Could they have been on a different frequency ? I will check the aviation blogs and share any info I find here.
Fangdog – my gut is that you are probably right. I am factoring in possibility of pilots unfamiliar with that airport to my thinking. But I am leaving an open mind for the possibility that the A350 was not on the centerline and just a little too far off … just a tiny little complacency about such things will get you.
I have been in and out of busy airports and it does get very fast, hectic and confusing. Especially, if it is not American English. I made up my mind to stay safe and deal with any screw-up I may have made latter, on the ground and across a desk.
We were constantly warned of possible ATC screwups and to always maintain spatial orientation as to towers, mountains and other obstructions. I had a couple buddies in both cases let ATC run them into a mountain.
Fangdog: You can be my wingman anytime!
Just kidding.
Pilot in command always responsible for safety of flight.
Thanks for your service.
“Unable” is the correct term. Don’t be afraid to use it.
My favorite is when they say “Everyone else is getting through” – usually in re: weather avoidance. I stay polite while calmly informing them that we will not be able to do that, will need a vector or altitude change of x or y instead. After 3 tries in a fast-moving environment I have been known to drily say, “Funny, that’s what they told Delta 191 in Dallas” (ATC kept telling them everyone else was getting through the gap). That always gets me a course correction, every time.
[Fellow Treepers this concept applies to one heck of a lot of other things too 1]
Concur.
…assuming the JAL lined up final on the duty runway.
“Clear on the right. Clear on the Left”
There is no way a landing aircraft should have another aircraft restricting any part of the runway, left or right. A landing aircraft could blow a tire, a sudden gust of wind or being off center.
I made a ton of formation landings on the wing of another aircraft. He’d landed on one half of the runway and I landed on his wing a few feet apart on the other half of the runway and never had a mishap nor did I ever witness a formation landing mishap.
I don’t see how anyone can fault the landing aircraft. I can see how the aircraft taking the runway for take-off can be at fault even if cleared by the tower to take the runway.
You misread my post. I agree with your line of thought. The comment on duty runway eliminates the use case of JAL creating the danger by landing on the wrong runway (assuming cleared to land) – a possibility when there are four available (Haneda). Mistakes get made. Heck, back in the day there were a few pilots who landed on the wrong carrier during multi-BG ops. Mistakes happen. I agree with you – nothing in the data stream thus far states or implies the wrong runway by the JAL aircrew. Ergo, what was the CG a/c doing?
As for restricting the runway – common sense. Unless, of course, one is flying into the barricade or a wire. But those aren’t aircraft…though they are stationary objects. No point belaboring that.
I completely agree with you vis where the limited evidence points.
Clear on the left…clear on the right refers to expected Coast Guard crew coordination when taxi’ing. Apologies for not making that clear.
The narrative gets more complicated if tower cleared the CG onto the duty runway for position and hold or roll and go. We both know that can be done given how a/c on approach are spaced on a time basis.
Seems the CG guys were lined up on the RWY waiting clearance (at least they thought) have no idea what was coming behind them. Q is, did JAL ever see them?
Help me out guys – where you getting your info ? Was the CG airplane lined up on the runway, or on a perpendicular taxiway waiting to cross ? Does anyone know which taxiway he was on ? Another thought occurred to me — if cg airplane was on a high speed exit taxiway, a wingtip could be angled, and still in the protected runway space ?
We had some training and review of some highly specific taxi charts a few years back because there were runway incursion problems of some widebodies who exited the runway, but not far enough, so a wingtip was over into protected airspace while cockpit was not. The joys of a swept wing where cockpit cannot see the tip — not a factor here.
Check out Regitiger’s video upthread, the damage on the AB350 seems almost conclusive that the -8 was struck directly from the rear just high enough to take out the landing jet’s nose dome on the other’s T-tail, the nose gear lost on the tail and or body, and the nearly mirrored damage on both engine nacelles of the AB350 indicate they apparently slammed into the rear of the high wings on the -8.
Very suggestive that the -8 was fully lined up on the center line of the runway.
Earthquake yesterday, plane crash today, what happens Wednesday – does Godzilla return?
Amazing job by the crew and passengers to get everyone out. This is why I always read the pamphlet on emergency procedures.
I bet those who caused the incident are tops in the class on pronouns though!
Someone in ATC f***Ed up.
That’s possible but there are numerous redundancies in place to prevent such incursions, primary of which is the pilot.
Since the Dash 8 CG pilot apparently survived, that narrative, if s/he makes it long-term, will be preserved in addition to the communications records.
Usually such accidents are numerous holes in the Swiss cheese of redundancy lining up to experience an adverse event. Even one small change and event avoided. IMO, the system is being severely tested in the current world scheme of things.
Kinda makes ya wanna take a train …
Not like Amtrak never screws up.
Sitting here at home in northern Minnesota with no large airports nearby, about an hour ago — approximately 8pm — we heard a noise so loud it made our windows shake.
Freaked us out.
Turned off the noise makers and went on a mission to see what caused the noise.
Apparently a jet had just passed over our house, followed soon by another one that we were at least somewhat prepared for.
Turned to my husband and asked if we were being attacked.
These days you just never know. Bad planes, bad pilots, bad governments, bad dreams.
That’s very interesting ? Where in Northern Minnesota are you — more or less. You can go to Flightaware.com to see who was flying in that area. 2 low level jets humming across the US-Canada border ? What’s that all about ?
Along Lake Superior, halfway between Duluth and Canada.
I’ve noted quite a few large planes flying low along the lake shore for months now, and always wonder why they are following the shore line and flying so low. Seems very suspicious for sure.
This is the first time it sounded like jets flying low — especially with how loud the first plane was.
Is it possible to look up what planes flew over after the fact at that site?
Thank you for any help you can give me in trying to see what’s going on around here!
Sounds gorgeous ! I am near Fort McCoy in Wisconsin and we have a fair amount of low level training flights in our area, but it is all very very slow. Usually C-130 or helicopters.
In answer to your question probably but I do not know how. Maybe the FlightAware tech support people can help you.
It could be a joint NORAD Air Defense exercise with Canada. I have flown in a number of those and been assigned to both high and low target aircraft. I can see whereby a low target could be loud.
If in fact it is what I think it is. Just relax and say to yourself, “I just heard the sound of freedom”.
Sounds good to me
Unbelievable that the passengers were able to get out of that Airbus.
They did a great job!
They could only use three of the eight slides to do it, as the right side was afire and the engine on the left side wouldn’t shut down for some reason so they couldn’t deploy the slide that was directly in front of the engine; that correct decision required good observation and communication of the crew.
With the nose gear destroyed the front was down very low, leading to low slide angles and slow transits, and the tail slide was way high, leading to a steep slide with fast transits that presented greater risk of injuries to passengers, but they did it, and did it well.
It looks more calm in this footage.
That’s incredible. No one could have survived.
I feel compelled to proffer a conspiracy theory.
They are telling us that they all survived so we’ll all get on planes and they’ll kill us too.
God hand and power clearly visible in this incident.
As a retired B-747 Captain who trained airline pilots for years, I believe I speak with some credibility on this subject. First, the cabin team did a remarkable job, apparently conducting an evacuation from a burning aircraft with few if any serious injuries and no fatalities. Kudos to them. As to what caused two aircraft to be on the same runway at the same time, I will wait for the full report. What I can say is that in this country something like this almost surely will happen. It’s just a matter of time. The insane DEI hiring programs for flight crews as well as ATC personnel will unfortunately be a major contributing factor. I invite you to view my American Thinker article from 2/8/2022 on the subject, titled: Woke Hiring by Airlines is A Scary Business – American Thinker