Austin International Airport: near disaster

FlightmechH3

FlightmechH3

Pre-takeoff checklist
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FlightmechH3
What the heck? Fed Ex had to abort to keep from crashing into a SW flight?
 
The SW aborted. That’s their track when they took off some minutes later.
 
And here FX1432. It turned left on the go around.

Must have been really tough for the fedex 747 to see the Southwest 737 rolling on its takeoff roll with 1/4 mile viz and freezing fog.

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Unless I'm completely off on my timestamp reading, did it take nearly a minute and a half after "cleared for takeoff" for the SWA bird to get rolling?
I'm used to getting takeoff clearance at the hold line, and immediately taking off; wouldn't ask for clearance if not ready.
But then again, a Skyhawk has a somewhat shorter checklist.
 
The other issue is as low as the weather was, why was he even in the ILS critical area while someone was on the final approach segment? The parallel taxiway (Alpha) has a ILS hold line one whole taxiway before the end of the runway (Foxtrot).
 
The way I originally heard the story was SWA aborted and the caused FedEx to go around. After listening multiple times, the FedEx pilot is the one who said “Southwest abort”, then announced “FedEx is on the go”. As foggy as it was here, it’s scary that the FedEx pilot saw SWA on the runway. The tower couldn’t see the runway.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
Unless I'm completely off on my timestamp reading, did it take nearly a minute and a half after "cleared for takeoff" for the SWA bird to get rolling?
I'm used to getting takeoff clearance at the hold line, and immediately taking off; wouldn't ask for clearance if not ready.
But then again, a Skyhawk has a somewhat shorter checklist.
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ATC will often issue takeoff clearance before reaching the runway. Doubt they sat at the hold short line that long.

flyingron said:
The other issue is as low as the weather was, why was he even in the ILS critical area while someone was on the final approach segment? The parallel taxiway (Alpha) has a ILS hold line one whole taxiway before the end of the runway (Foxtrot).
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You don't hold short of it unless ATC tells you to.
 
Big iron guys—-normal to clear for t/o with heavy on 3 mile final? Especially with 1/4 mile vis??
 
benyflyguy said:
Big iron guys—-normal to clear for t/o with heavy on 3 mile final? Especially with 1/4 mile vis??
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3 miles is nothing. In Europe they’ll clear you to land at like 500ft. London is notorious. I think the lowest we got a landing clearance was 200ft. As long as you have the separation, you’re good
 
jordane93 said:
3 miles is nothing. In Europe they’ll clear you to land at like 500ft. London is notorious. I think the lowest we got a landing clearance was 200ft. As long as you have the separation, you’re good
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My question really is: Is 3 mile final good enough separation for someone to get a take off clearance and not even be on the runway yet. Sure if the SW guy was line up and wait. But if not even on runway yet??
 
Do such aircraft have traffic displayed in the cockpit?
Might be handy when you can't see chit out the window.
 
A culmination of simple errors that could have resulted in a catastrophe.
 
benyflyguy said:
My question really is: Is 3 mile final good enough separation for someone to get a take off clearance and not even be on the runway yet. Sure if the SW guy was line up and wait. But if not even on runway yet??
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3 miles should be plenty. Planes are doing like 130-150kts on final so that’s like 2ish miles per/minute so you’ll have at least a minute to get into position. Not sure what kind of separation ATC needs
 
dmspilot said:
You don't hold short of it unless ATC tells you to.
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That's my point. ATC shouldn't have even let them near the runway let alone takeoff with someone on the final approach segment when the weather is that crappy.
 
ATC should not be near any airport after this. He was apathetic as heck and 100% at fault.

Maybe he can get a job as an Airboss for the CAF.
 
jordane93 said:
3 miles should be plenty. Planes are doing like 130-150kts on final so that’s like 2ish miles per/minute so you’ll have at least a minute to get into position. Not sure what kind of separation ATC needs
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Respectfully disagree. Three miles is the minimum on a nice VFR day. With weather like this, everything slows down. Taxi speeds are slower, the turn to line up is slower. It won’t be SWA standard timing.

I don’t know what the temperature was, but with that vis and the cold snap Texas has been having, I wouldn’t be surprised if SWA had to also do an engine run up before takeoff. And if they did, the definitely should have let tower know that they were going to need 30 seconds on the runway.

But that’s all just my knee jerk conjecture. I’m sure this won’t be the last we hear of this incident.
 
SWA said they were rolling. However, that roll was very delayed, so FEDEX overflew them before SWA rotated. I think this will be SWA pilots' fault for not rolling when they got onto the runway. Something delayed them.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
Unless I'm completely off on my timestamp reading, did it take nearly a minute and a half after "cleared for takeoff" for the SWA bird to get rolling?
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Per Juan (blancolerio.com), SW was holding off the runway when cleared. I thought it was 30 seconds, but even 1.5 minutes doesn't seem so long to taxi into position and get rolling.

There's no way this incident is pilot error. It's all on ATC/tower, it seems to me. If Juan is right, the FedEx crew saved the day.

HHH
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Van Johnston said:
The SW aborted. That’s their track when they took off some minutes later.
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There was no abort for SW, according to the Juan Browne analysis. The Fedex pilot did call for SW to abort, which was remarkable, but the SW 737 continued with its takeoff.
 
Hunter Handsfield said:
Per Juan (blancolerio.com), SW was holding off the runway when cleared. I thought it was 30 seconds, but even 1.5 minutes doesn't seem so long to taxi into position and get rolling.

There's no way this incident is pilot error. It's all on ATC/tower, it seems to me. If Juan is right, the FedEx crew saved the day.

HHH
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I’d like to know how long it took SWA to roll after getting takeoff clearance. With that weather they would most certainly had to have done an anti-ice engine run up (10° or less and less than 1 mile visibility). I’ve never flown the 737, but I’m sure it’s like other large airplanes where that’s going to at least be 30 seconds for the run up, if not more. If we have to do an engine run up, we always let tower know that we’re going to need extra time on the runway on the initial call so they can plan for that. Didn’t hear SWA make that call and don’t know if it would have changed anything for the controller.
 
NoHeat said:
There was no abort for SW, according to the Juan Browne analysis. The Fedex pilot did call for SW to abort, which was remarkable, but the SW 737 continued with its takeoff.
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Juan says tower thanked FedEx after they came around and landed, but didn't play the audio of that exchange. It seems to imply tower knew they were responsible.

HHH

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Just saw the blanco video, holy crap I had no idea this was a low RVR scenario. The FDX crew saved the day with above average SA for the conditions, full stop. Both AUS and that SW crew couldn't get out of their own way if they tried, by comparison.

Seems AUS twr sped and it almost cost a bunch of people their lives. The FDX crew showed high level of SA all the way back to final, nevermind initiating a cat ii/iii go-around based on late-show traffic on the runway in that kind of (RVR) conditions. In theory, at true iii minima they wouldn't have seen it until they were smacking into them on touchdown, and nothing able to be done about it.

The SWA guys didn't sound like they had an eff-all clue what the overtake situation was, they were sucking their thumbs and I bet the NTSB is gonna lay partial blame on their dilly dallying. If they weren't in a position to throttle up, they should have piped up asap so tower could send FDX around before the latter had to resort to end game glove save, which could have easily contributed to a loss of control fatality (it has happened for less). I'd be curious what was the dynamic in the SWA cockpit.

Hope things get shaken at AUS, changes need to be made anyways at that place. They're due for a major attitude adjustment, from where I sit at least as a local "customer".
 
Sluggo63 said:
I’d like to know how long it took SWA to roll after getting takeoff clearance. With that weather they would most certainly had to have done an anti-ice engine run up (10° or less and less than 1 mile visibility).
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Dunno about SWA, but it was 3 degrees or less for us for the run-up (the 10 degrees or less was just for the engine anti-ice being on), but yes: 70% N1 for 30 seconds is what they wanted unless the plane started to slide. Of course, we'd always let Tower know if that's what we needed.
 
flyingron said:
The other issue is as low as the weather was, why was he even in the ILS critical area while someone was on the final approach segment? The parallel taxiway (Alpha) has a ILS hold line one whole taxiway before the end of the runway (Foxtrot).
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Do you think the SWA should have used some common sense and told ATC we are going to wait until the FedEX lands knowing they are going to be the ILS critical area when they entered the runway.. with a CAT 3 767 at three miles, SWA crew shpuld have gotten their heads out there butts and woke up as to the situation developing rather then blindly do what the controller cleared them to do,, situational awareness lost by SWA. I wonder if they even realized they had a 767 on top of them, Kudos the Fed EX crew nice save.
 
NoHeat said:
There was no abort for SW, according to the Juan Browne analysis. The Fedex pilot did call for SW to abort, which was remarkable, but the SW 737 continued with its takeoff.
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Tha'ts because SWA was clueless about what was happening
 
kayoh190 said:
Dunno about SWA, but it was 3 degrees or less for us for the run-up (the 10 degrees or less was just for the engine anti-ice being on), but yes: 70% N1 for 30 seconds is what they wanted unless the plane started to slide. Of course, we'd always let Tower know if that's what we needed.
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You’re absolutely right. I mistyped. 10 or less for EAI on, 3 or less for the run up (in the current plane). Thanks for pointing that out. I think I saw it was -1 there, so I’m sure they were having to do a run up.
 
One thing that isn’t being talked about (because it’s relativity inside knowledge) is that most of FedEx’s fleet (except for the Airbus) have HUDs installed. And in those HUDs, they have EVAS (Enhanced Vision Assurance System) which is basically an infrared camera that can be used to see through “stuff.”
I’ll say, though, that EVAS can be pretty sketchy in wet cloud, not really allowing you to see much, but there’s a chance they had eyes on the 737 a little sooner than they would have had they just been using natural vision. The EVAS works great in haze and smog though.
 
NoHeat said:
There was no abort for SW, according to the Juan Browne analysis. The Fedex pilot did call for SW to abort, which was remarkable, but the SW 737 continued with its takeoff.
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yeah, I messed up. I was looking at this morning’s flight on FlightAware. It left about 25 minutes later.
 
Sluggo63 said:
One thing that isn’t being talked about (because it’s relativity inside knowledge) is that most of FedEx’s fleet (except for the Airbus) have HUDs installed. And in those HUDs, they have EVAS (Enhanced Vision Assurance System) which is basically an infrared camera that can be used to see through “stuff.”
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That is interesting.

So during a CAT III ILS approach, does the FedEx first officer on a 767 look up through the windshield and watch the HUD, or keep eyes down on the panel as Juan Browne described in his video?
 
NoHeat said:
That is interesting.

So during a CAT III ILS approach, does the FedEx first officer on a 767 look up through the windshield and watch the HUD, or keep eyes down on the panel as Juan Browne described in his video?
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Not really.

So, the HUD is only on the Captain's side (although they say they are going to install repeaters for the FO). And on a CAT III, there's no requirement to even see to land, so the HUD is irrelevant anyhow. The FO will be looking inside to ensure that the plane tracks the ILS properly and none of the many alerts that could pop up and invalidate the CAT III appear.

There's two parts to the HUD system, the actual HUD with all the symbology and the EVAS (FLIR) part. Those two separate systems serve two totally different functions.

The HUD has takeoff guidance and that allows us to lower our takeoff minimums at certain airports down to 300 RVR. That part has nothing to do with the EVAS part.

The EVAS allows us to land in 2 very niche cases. We can use the EVAS to lover the mins on an approach plate based on EVAS use. So, if the ILS at KXYZ has mins of 1800 RVR, we can look in a table and lower that to 1400 RVR (I think, I don't have the table in front of me). So, if the airport is calling 1400 RVR, we can shoot the CAT I ILS into there.

The second case is being able to descend below DA without seeing any approach lights with natural vision, as long as the Captain can see them in the HUD. Then we would still need all the 91.175(c) stuff to continue below 100 above the TDZE.

I've found the EVAS to be really hit or miss in cloud. You might see the runway lights a little sooner than with natural vision depending on how "wet" they are. In places like Delhi and Beijing where it's mostly smoke, smog, haze, dust, dirt obscuring visibility, it's pretty amazing actually. You can see the runway miles away in the HUD where with natural vision, you may not see it until you're a mile or two from landing.
 
strangebird said:
Do you think the SWA should have used some common sense and told ATC we are going to wait until the FedEX lands knowing they are going to be the ILS critical area when they entered the runway.. with a CAT 3 767 at three miles, SWA crew shpuld have gotten their heads out there butts and woke up as to the situation developing rather then blindly do what the controller cleared them to do,, situational awareness lost by SWA. I wonder if they even realized they had a 767 on top of them, Kudos the Fed EX crew nice save.
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Was thinking the same thing. High SA, patience, and not blindly trusting ATC in low viz conditions saved a bunch of lives at PVD some 10 years ago

 
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