AC Lining Up with a Taxiway SFO...?

[pelmet]

You're welcome. May I ask where you work?

In America mostly. You will have to figure out the rest.

[Rockie]

Airline? Corporate? Cessna 152?

[pelmet]

Airline? Corporate? Cessna 152?

I fly several Cessna aircraft actually.

[AuxBatOn]

pelmet,

Do you fly commercially?

[Rockie]

Airline? Corporate? Cessna 152?

I fly several Cessna aircraft actually.

Well that's a relief. I'll sleep better knowing where your indictment of my CRM skills comes from.

[Cat Driver]

Well based on looking back over the years and the tone of posts written by Rockie and pelmet I personally would choose pelmet as a crew member.

[pelmet]

pelmet,

Do you fly commercially?

I am a simmer. In fact, I am going to do some today .

[Rockie]

Well based on looking back over the years and the tone of posts written by Rockie and pelmet I personally would choose pelmet as a crew member.

Now that comes as literally no surprise. If the intent was to hurt my feelings you missed.

[Cat Driver]

Rockie the very last thing that concerns me is worrying what someone with a made up name on the internet thinks about me.

You could be twelve years old with nothing better to do than use the internet for entertainment.

. . aka Cat Driver.

[Rockie]

Rockie the very last thing that concerns me is worrying what someone with a made up name on the internet thinks about me.

. . aka Cat Driver.

Of course not, that's why you always react so well to criticism.

Rockie aka Rockie

[pelmet]

Airline? Corporate? Cessna 152?

I fly several Cessna aircraft actually.

Well that's a relief. I'll sleep better knowing where your indictment of my CRM skills comes from.

What kind of background would somebody need to have in order for you to consider their opinion on CRM skills as being valid? I see that more and more airlines including in Canada have very inexperienced F/O's. It is quite plausible that AC could someday have an ab initio program. Your statement gives the appearance that their opinions would be given little consideration based on their background.

[Rockie]

What kind of background would somebody need to have in order to have an opinion on CRM skills that you would consider valid?

Any kind of background is better than none.

I get the impression you think CRM is an afternoon course you take once a year at groundschool. You also seem to think it involves not much more than not being snarky to the FO - which I'm not by the way, but then I've never had you as an FO.

CRM is one of the foundational pillars upon which all our policies and procedures are based. From day one of training and checking CRM carries equal weight to technical skills and is mostly to credit for the safety record this industry enjoys today. When you come and work with me in my job, and I mean with me personally you may then feel free to critique my CRM skills. Then I'll critique yours. Until then you'll have to excuse me if I appear unconcerned with your assessment.

[pelmet]

I get the impression you think CRM is an afternoon course you take once a year at groundschool.

Please show the specifics of where this statement came from.

You also seem to think it involves not much more than not being snarky to the FO

It would appear that you have already forgotten that I said and posted information on how it involves using all your resources including ATC. A CRM tool that likely would have prevented this incident.

[Rockie]

Rockie wrote:
I get the impression you think CRM is an afternoon course you take once a year at groundschool.


Please show the specifics of where this statement came from.

As I said, just an impression.

Rockie wrote:
You also seem to think it involves not much more than not being snarky to the FO


It would appear that you have already forgotten that I said and posted information on how it involves using all your resources including ATC. A CRM tool that likely would have prevented this incident.

As I said again "not much more" than not being snarky to the FO.

[pelmet]

Rockie wrote:
I get the impression you think CRM is an afternoon course you take once a year at groundschool.


Please show the specifics of where this statement came from.

As I said, just an impression.

Rockie wrote:
You also seem to think it involves not much more than not being snarky to the FO


It would appear that you have already forgotten that I said and posted information on how it involves using all your resources including ATC. A CRM tool that likely would have prevented this incident.

As I said again "not much more" than not being snarky to the FO.

It appears that you are just making things up as responses based on nothing, so I will leave it at that.

I don't really have anything else to add. This kind of incident could have happened to anyone including me. I have misidentified a runway before in VFR flying and so have many others. It is very, very easy as I'm sure most of us know.

Thanks for the replies.

[confusedalot]

can someone out there puleese gimme at least a theory about why this occurred?

I am still going with mistaken lights cuz 28L lights were out. cat driver indicates fatique, which to my mind is valid.

[crazyaviator]

It is very, very easy as I'm sure most of us know

.

If it is that easy,,, then perhaps there should be a scantily clad flag girl waving a runway sign for the pilots to steer their big bird to the right runway ( like at Oshkosh after landing ) HMM or maybe an ace up the sleeve,,, like say the ILS tuned and able to give raw data as a back-up. How many military and civilian jets landed on the wrong airport and sometimes a real short one due to not tuning in and confirming A radio nav-aid for the intended airport. Maybe there should be a BIG red light and a BIG green light in the cockpit to show that the pilot is approaching the right payment at the right airport ? .

[pelmet]

can someone out there puleese gimme at least a theory about why this occurred?

I am still going with mistaken lights cuz 28L lights were out. cat driver indicates fatique, which to my mind is valid.

The aircraft was cleared for a visual arrival procedure that is offset and requires them to align with the runway on about a four mile final at which point the pilots had a clearance to proceed visually to runway 28R. The aircraft has a navigation system(frequently referred to as an FMS) that uses inertial reference to generate a flight path that they followed for the visual arrival. Many aircraft now use GPS updating to maintain a high level of accuracy in their FMS, however, only some of Air Canada's A320's have GPS updating which did not include this aircraft. This means that over time, there can be an increasing error in navigational accuracy. While the FMS was considered accurate enough for the arrival procedure, it was not considered as trustworthy to align them onto final approach for 28R using the published RNAV approach. Pilots on many other types would simply tune the ILS and intercept the final approach course but apparently, this is difficult to do on the Airbus due to the design of the avionics. Therefore, the pilots decided to rely on visual cues only for alignment with the runway.

There was a notam for the approach lights on 28L being inoperative, however they were cleared for runway 28R. Only one set of approach lights were illuminated and that is what they expected. However, they obviously somehow got in their heads backwards that the runway lights for 28L were the ones that were illuminated. Therefore they were expecting to land on the runway with no approach lights. Whether this was due to a misreading of the notams or forgetting the details of the notam by one or both is unknown. However, as the turned final, the planned to land on the strip of pavement that is close to, parallel to, and to the right of the strip of pavement with the approach lights illuminated. Due to their error, this strip of pavement was not 28R but was taxiway Charlie.

Taxiway Charlie is parallel to and close to runway 28R with edge and centerline lights on it. These lights are a different colour than a runway but the crew did not pick up on this and therefore felt that by landing on the strip of pavement to the right of the approach lights would be runway 28R. The lights of the taxiing aircraft on taxiway Charlie seemed unusual to them and made them wonder if aircraft or vehicles were on the strip of pavement that they were landing on. The tower said that runway 28R was clear which gave the crew the confidence to continue. Likely, there was still some doubt about the lights but that it would make more sense as they got closer and would lead to a safe landing.

Based on an incident several years ago where a Delta 767 landed on a taxiway in Atlanta, it is quite possible that the taxiway centerline lights do not appear to be green when a few miles back.

All just theory of course.

[Jet Jockey]

can someone out there puleese gimme at least a theory about why this occurred?

I am still going with mistaken lights cuz 28L lights were out. cat driver indicates fatique, which to my mind is valid.

The aircraft was cleared for a visual arrival procedure that is offset and requires them to align with the runway on about a four mile final at which point the pilots had a clearance to proceed visually to runway 28R. The aircraft has a navigation system(frequently referred to as an FMS) that uses inertial reference to generate a flight path that they followed for the visual arrival. Many aircraft now use GPS updating to maintain a high level of accuracy in their FMS, however, only some of Air Canada's A320's have GPS updating which did not include this aircraft. This means that over time, there can be an increasing error in navigational accuracy. While the FMS was considered accurate enough for the arrival procedure, it was not considered as trustworthy to align them onto final approach for 28R using the published RNAV approach. Pilots on many other types would simply tune the ILS and intercept the final approach course but apparently, this is difficult to do on the Airbus due to the design of the avionics. Therefore, the pilots decided to rely on visual cues only for alignment with the runway.

There was a notam for the approach lights on 28L being inoperative, however they were cleared for runway 28R. Only one set of approach lights were illuminated and that is what they expected. However, they obviously somehow got in their heads backwards that the runway lights for 28L were the ones that were illuminated. Therefore they were expecting to land on the runway with no approach lights. Whether this was due to a misreading of the notams or forgetting the details of the notam by one or both is unknown. However, as the turned final, the planned to land on the strip of pavement that is close to, parallel to, and to the right of the strip of pavement with the approach lights illuminated. Due to their error, this strip of pavement was not 28R but was taxiway Charlie.

Taxiway Charlie is parallel to and close to runway 28R with edge and centerline lights on it. These lights are a different colour than a runway but the crew did not pick up on this and therefore felt that by landing on the strip of pavement to the right of the approach lights would be runway 28R. The lights of the taxiing aircraft on taxiway Charlie seemed unusual to them and made them wonder if aircraft or vehicles were on the strip of pavement that they were landing on. The tower said that runway 28R was clear which gave the crew the confidence to continue. Likely, there was still some doubt about the lights but that it would make more sense as they got closer and would lead to a safe landing.

Based on an incident several years ago where a Delta 767 landed on a taxiway in Atlanta, it is quite possible that the taxiway centerline lights do not appear to be green when a few miles back.

All just theory of course.

Sounds good to me, however I would like to add a few points...

1 - On the FMS thing, although not equipped with GPS to keep the most up to date a precise navigation available, wouldn't the FMS use the second most accurate navaids available to it , DME/DME to avoid map shift and navigational errors. Although not as "accurate" as GPS, DME/DME is extremely accurate, enough to take you to the threshold of the runway.

2 - I would perhaps add "fatigue" in there as a possible cause. Perhaps the flight crew were tired and so on.

3 - A question... Are the centerline green taxi lights always bidirectional or are they at some airports or in some instances unidirectional?

[JeppsOnFire]

I'm automatically inclined to disagree with anything Rockie has to say simply on principle, because on the internet, he comes across as a total anti-social douche bag with enough direct industry experience to sufficiently mask his lack of critical thinking ability. I read his posts and cannot recall a time when he's admitted he was flat out wrong (not a misunderstanding or other forms of ill communication, just simply wrong). There's a word for someone who is never wrong. Fool.

However, this is the internet and perhaps he's a calm, knowledgable, witty barrel of laughs in reality, who knows?

That being said, I agree with Rockie on this issue. I know when YYC got their parallel, there were several CADORs about airplanes lining up with the wrong runway, day VFR. Whenever there is something unusual introduced to a painfully routine flight, it should be sufficiently spotlighted. A level of fatigue is likely and the closed runway changing the the visual cues (confirmation bias or whatever) certainly played some role.

The occurrence pilots are absolutely responsible; they had no less information available to them than all the other planes that approached/landed safely that night. They will receive their consequences and we all should all be thankful it wasn't us and move forward motivated to not make the same mistake.

[Old fella]

Oh well....... shit happens even to the best of'em

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHMhClzfoi8

[pelmet]

2 - I would perhaps add "fatigue" in there as a possible cause. Perhaps the flight crew were tired and so on.

People love the fatigue thing as an excuse. There are all kinds of pilots flying into SFO after longhaul flights from Europe, Asia, and Latin America along with regional guys with crap schedules and mainline guys arriving from the eastern part of the country every day and it has been that way for years. Yet they complete the flight without incident. Admittedly, both sets of approach lights are usually illuminated. Misidentifications like this can easily happen to any crew at any level of fatigue including being fully awake after a nice snooze.

The bottom line is...fatigue is a regular part of the typical airline pilot that is for the most part unavoidable. In this case, being AC combined with a fairly long flight, they both had penty of time to legally snooze enroute in the cockpit, unlike many who illegally(but wisely) snooze enroute in the cockpit or are on short haul and don't get the chance.

[pelmet]

I don't know why I'm getting involved in this, but...

Pelmet and Cat, what exactly is it that you two are looking for?

Is your idea of a desirable outcome if the pilots were to hold a press conference and say "No excuses, we just f'ed up, there is no point to look any further, it was simply and completely our fault, please deduct $25 from our paychecks and send us our pink slips. The world will be safer with us incompetent pilots finally out of the skies".

Because if that's not what you are desiring, it's certainly coming across that way.

I apologise in advance for making a large post based on quotes from my earlier posts. My intention on this thread has been:
(a) to present as much factual information as possible as can be seen in these copies of earlier posts by me.
(b) get more technical information from others on this thread.
(c) Try to promote ways to avoid this from happening in the future by me or anyone else.

I have posted some but not all of my earlier posts here as proof. I admit that I did get in a back and forth with Rockie when he said that no one would consider doing the one thing that I suggested that I feel would actually have prevented this incident. But Rockie and I debate on a regular basis and he always loses

I'm sorry if you don't like my attempts to learn and prevent. Unfortunately, as can be seen from the post I am responding to, for some strange reason, some people seem to take offense at suggestions on how to prevent a future incident/accident personally as if I think that I would never make the same error. Not true, I know I could very likely have made the same error. That is one reason why I am posting. At minimum, it might save my butt and hopefully others as well, which is the desirable outcome. Personally, I think it beats using the fatigue excuse almost seems as if nothing else really matters.

So here are a few of my posts from earlier in the thread as proof of what my desired outcome is, which is get the facts and prevent from happening again. (I have made the font small to keep this post shorter).

Apparently cleared for a Bridge visual not a SOIA.
This post that I linked from another forum seems like a very plausible scenario....Perhaps only one set of approach and runway lights that are assumed to be for the other runway. If it looked like the first video at 3:41 seconds but without the PAPIs for 28L illuminated, one starts to see what may have happened. To add to it......A set of bright approach lights visible, a second set of green lights visible(oops, don't we all know that they are for taxiways only), crew has been to SFO several times but never seen the north parallel taxiway used and not really aware that it exists.
http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/5969 ... ost9827343
Also, some audio here....
https://soundcloud.com/user-66001055/au ... liveatcnet
I wonder if the Bridge Visual is in the FMS and being displayed on the PFD and if so, can an ILS still be tuned as a backup?

I have noticed at my company that some pilots like to turn off the taxi light when the aircraft comes to a stop(although there was a memo saying not to do it). Perhaps this is a good reason right here to show why the light should be kept on. It might prevent a disaster. Taxi lights do not normally provide distraction for someone on approach. That being said, if someone is approaching to land on top of you, what can you do. those on the ground called the tower. I wonder if they started flashing landing lights as well. Might make the errant crew notice you earlier.
Another thought comes to mind as well....The pilots were asking about the lights on the runway. They then continued the approach after being reassured by the tower that the runway was clear and of course, the pilots believed that they were on the proper flight path to that runway. In my experience, when a major screw-up is being made, there is usually a hint of some sort...that little warning. Something that just doesn't make sense. Based on my own experience, that hint can easily be tossed aside and an excuse(which doesn't make sense either) is made to justify that out of the ordinary thing being seen. So when you see something like this that just doesn't make sense....it is time for the alarm bells to go off.

Typically, one just sets up for the ILS approach(or RNAV if ILS not available) which brings you down on the centerline making visual illusions less likely to result in lining up with something that you should not be lining up with. Seattle is a good example that catches the occasional airliner landing on a taxiway instead of a runway. The last guys to do it in SEA were a locally based crew accepting a sidestep with sunshine in their eyes.

Based on the large number of aircraft that have landed on wrong runways, taxiways, and even the wrong airports over the years, you might want to re-evaluate that idea that no one would think to use the ILS as a back-up. It was one of the first things I thought of when I heard about this incident.
There are too many illusions and possibilities for misidentification as we see over and over again. When the system being used is not accurate enough to guarantee alignment of the aircraft with the runway, manually tuning an available ILS as a backup, if reasonably easy to do, is an obvious simple thing to do if it does not cause interference with other required indications, especially at night.
One shouldn't need to wait for others to consider it in the future when we have the tools to do certain thing ourselves in the present.

Your direct knowledge about procedures on this aircraft are much appreciated Rockie. Perhaps you even train pilots going into SFO using this procedure....
Someone mentioned on another forum that if the Airbus is set up for the charted FMS Bridge Visual Approach, it is not possible to have ILS indications on display. Is this correct? It would mean that using the ILS as a backup would be impossible.
Also, are the instrument indications given by the FMS Bridge Visual approach accurate enough to align the aircraft fairly accurately with the runway the way an RNAV approach seems to do.

Fatigue is frequently used as an excuse. It is near impossible to do long haul and avoid fatigue. No shortage of long haul carriers go into SFO. Aside from one crew from a country that has written off a large number of wide body jets around the world, I haven't heard of too many issues at this airport. Misidentifying a runway has happened plenty of times though over the years in a variety of locations.
Just landed at a triple parallel runway airport tonight with plenty of parallel taxiways with the green centreline lighting. Including taxiways, there are 8 parallel lighted strips. Cleared for the visual....ILS tuning made sure that there was no problem. It's that easy on some aircraft. But can it be done on an Airbus....
From another forum, it appears that this guys has some experience on type and knows the possibilities....
"In the A320 the display of ILS GS and LOC symbology on the PFD is incompatible with using the autoflight system to fly a non-precison approach. The ILS may be hard-tuned but the crew will not see the data unless they select the LS pushbutton or switch the Nav Display over to ROSE LS mode. If they do press the LS pushbutton after loading an approach with vertical guidance, they will get a flashing amber V/DEV message on the PFD to highlight the incompatible selection. I do not have experience of any 'FMS coded' visual approaches (RNAV visuals in other parlance?) but I expect that the FMGS behaviour is the same.
In the case of a classic visual approach, with just the runway selected in the FMGS, the ILS will have auto-tuned (the FMGS will know that it is an ILS runway) and the data can be displayed on the PFD without any advisory messages; the selections are compatible. However, by coding the visual approach trajectory into the FMGS it has effectively been transformed into a non-precison approach, and the selection of supporting ILS information is not as straightforward.
Bearing in mind the above information, just try writing a procedure to turn what may sometimes be a valid technique into a SOP. You would have to decide at what point it would be safe for the crew to start making fundamental changes to their EFIS set-up in order to discard the FMGS guidance and switch to ILS data. You would also need to consider if your procedure is robust enough to cope with the different cases of a non-ILS runway, ILS not available and a full-up ILS.
I also think it is worth pointing-out that hard-tuning the ILS requires manual entry of data from a different approach and introduces the chance of incorrect data entry. What if the FMS Quiet Bridge approach to 28R had been selected, but going to a different plate to obtain the ILS ident resulted in the tuning of the ILS for 28L? The technique is valid, but it is not a completely threat/error free."
Bottom line.....if you don't have the ILS back-up, be a bit paranoid. Brief the lights expected to be seen. The different types of approach lighting, perhaps confirmation with tower on what is illuminated, a reminder of the colours, etc. Similar to a low vis non-precision approach using an NDB or VOR. I landed on the wrong parallel runway once in low vis with a crosswind NDB approach. It was in the sim but it can easily happen.

Due to it being difficult to display the ILS as a backup on the Airbus, one needs to compensate for this shortcoming. On the briefing one should review the lighting to be expected on this approach and the layout of runways and taxiways. Four strips of pavement are in front of the aircraft. Two runways, and two taxiways. After reviewing that, review the approach lighting. They may have different appearances. Review notams as this would have shown that 28L was U/S. Even so, one would be wise to confirm with the tower, which approach lights are illuminated if only one set is illuminated as the other set could be on test.

[pelmet]

Well, I am going to take that as a no, you are not an airline pilot. Most, if not all guys/gals here let it be known their airline background especially with posts on such matters. Why not share your aviation background and qualifications, by your posts it is quite evident you are knowledgeable.
As mentioned in many of my postings I am not an airline pilot, never was. My background is from industry , then TC and NC , now retired ATPL in the 6000-8000 TT range, plenty of light turbine aka BE 90/100/200 stuff. Only thing I flown above 300kts and above FL300 is a C550.

If you carefully read through my posts from the past, you will figure it out. Enjoy.

Well...... on the ten foot Avcanada totem pole it is my considered opinion you don't rate that high in order for me to research your commentary to determine your aviation curriculum vitae. Suffice it to say, I do not have the interest to hazard an educated guess either. I will take your postings with " a grain of salt", perhaps others may feel the same, who knows. See ya!

Thanks for your contribution. Interesting that a TC guy decides how to interpret someone's posts based on what their background is instead of the content of the post. Feel free to find and post specifics in what I have said that you disagree with. Perhaps you have something to add with your years of experience. It is all about learning from and preventing these incidents and possibly saving lives.

[pelmet]

Well...... on the ten foot Avcanada totem pole it is my considered opinion you don't rate that high in order for me to research your commentary to determine your aviation curriculum vitae. Suffice it to say, I do not have the interest to hazard an educated guess either. I will take your postings with " a grain of salt", perhaps others may feel the same, who knows. See ya!

Thanks for your contribution. Interesting that a TC guy decides how to interpret someone's posts based on what their background is instead of the content of the post. Feel free to find and post specifics in what I have said that you disagree with. Perhaps you have something to add with your years of experience. It is all about learning from and preventing these incidents and possibly saving lives.

I am not qualified to provide counselling/commentary on matters of any type of airline operations be it this topic, Halifax or whatever. I will leave it at that.

This thread, at least the earlier part of it, is about an aircraft that nearly landed on a taxiway at night at a busy airport. It happened to be an airline but these things happen to airplanes from a variety of operations. I should think that someone with around 8,000 hours of flying including a bunch of turbine stuff and worked at TC is qualified to comment and provide insight on how to prevent such a thing from happening again. So could someone else with much less experience as well but perhaps has experienced a similar issue or perhaps has prevented a similar issue from happening using certain techniques.

Pilots of lesser experience may have valuable information to provide to plots of higher experience. We should not get into the mindset that this is not the case. 8000 hours. I'm sure you must have an idea of what you might do in your Citation in a similar scenario.

By the way, I might just have some airline experience but I am happy to remain anonymous. Or you could enjoy reading my 2413 posts in detail to find out more. Trust me....you will love it, especially my debates with Rockie