Jazz CRJ crash at LaGuardia

[flieslikeachicken]

If the argument is made against the ARFF driver, it sounds stupid and condescending, eh?

Yes, that's why I never made those arguments so don't produce fake quotes.

My reply was obviously a modified quote with the intention of showing that your reply was rude and without useful purpose, hence the red text. Any reasonable person would understand that.

Have a good night.

[rudder]

NTSB HD video of accident site and debris field.

Those that are familiar with the aircraft will recognize many of the components from the forward galley and flight deck. Much of that debris is near or under the ARFF vehicle.

The video gives a perspective of the construction of the ARFF vehicle. It appears from the underside view to be built like a tank.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaPcmyCYiMI&t=9s

[7ECA]

That's just horrific to watch, to see the level of damage that occurred to the forward end of the aircraft in such graphic detail.

The photos that came out were bad enough, but that video is awful to see.

[MX-5]

NTSB HD video of accident site and debris field.

Those that are familiar with the aircraft will recognize many of the components from the forward galley and flight deck. Much of that debris is near or under the ARFF vehicle.

The video gives a perspective of the construction of the ARFF vehicle. It appears from the underside view to be built like a tank.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zaPcmyCYiMI&t=9s

From the video, which direction is the aircraft now facing? 04?

[boeingboy]

Not at all.

As I wrote, your message to 'be responsible for situational awareness' sounds great from a distance but when you try to apply it, it loses a lot of its meaning because it's too vague. It's a relatively empty statement.

Note that I asked you for specifics on how to implement it. You ignored that part and instead went personal. Not really the hallmark of a strong argument.

Your message might not have blamed the pilots, but it inferred that they could have handled the situation better and possibly avoided it. While technically correct, I find that too unrealistic given the chain of events and the timing and contents of the radio calls.

My argument was that we as pilots, including the two involved in this accident, are responsible for maintaining situational awareness during flight. There was time, had they heard the crossing clearance, to process that the fire truck was cleared to cross the runway that they were about to land on, and conduct a normal go around.

That is far from vague and you are arguing with me for the sake of arguing. I get it, you're upset that this accident was preventable and that the crew did not have much opportunity to do anything but suffered the ultimate consequence nonetheless. Regardless of the fact that they are victims and did everything as any other pilot would do, there were a few moments where they could have done just a bit more and that is something that we can take away as a reminder to keep listening to the radio.

Of course my entire argument hinges on the tower and ground frequencies being tied, but we'll have to wait for the prelim report to find out whether that was the case or not.

To dumb it down: the pilots are victims and did as they were trained. We can take away from the crash that we all can improve our situational awareness by listening into the radio, even during high workload periods.

How about the situational awareness of the fire fighters? Yes - they were cleared across the runway - however they failed to follow SOP by entering the runway with the runway status light being red. (this was confirmed by the NTSB) You can also clearly see in the video that truck 1 proceeds onto the runway but "and company" all stay put and do not move. If runway status lights are red - you cannot proceed under any circumstances and are supposed to call ATC and report you are still holding due to red lights.

Its clear that both the tower controllers and the fire fighters lost complete situational awareness. The pilots I do not believe they did. They were 20 seconds and 100 ft from collision when truck 1 was cleared. Not only were they concentrating on the landing - but even if they heard the call....they dont necessarily know where taxiway D is. They would have already been on the ground by the time the brain was able to process any possible issue.

[Prodriver]

I wonder if it is time to change how these trucks and equipment operate at these large busy airports? They should only be allowed to cross an active runway at the ends unless there is a full ground stop and aircraft are being sent around. This would help prevent this kind of accident, if a mistake is made, the 35' obstacle clearance on an IFR departure would help to insure that there is no issues and hopefully turn a mistake into an incident instead of an accident. Just an idea. This one stings.

[cdnavater]

The 1997 accident is not all that similar but the procedure change should have prevented a single controller working both.
“https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/article/wh ... collision/
An NTSB final report into a 1997 collision at LaGuardia between a private jet and a vehicle referenced new procedures being put in place afterward to ensure “local and ground positions shall not be combined prior to” midnight at the New York airport.

It was unclear whether those procedures remain in place. A spokesperson for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey referred questions to the Federal Aviation Administration, which manages U.S. air traffic control”

[Old fella]

That's just horrific to watch, to see the level of damage that occurred to the forward end of the aircraft in such graphic detail.

The photos that came out were bad enough, but that video is awful to see.

Very much so, horrific and quite disturbing to look at that CCTV vid clip of two undoubtedly well trained , competent and promising young pilots loosing their lives in such a manner. Very hard to put into words this terrible accident as well as that DCA mid-air other year. Makes me wonder what aviation is coming to these days in the US.

[philaviate]

I wonder if it is time to change how these trucks and equipment operate at these large busy airports? They should only be allowed to cross an active runway at the ends unless there is a full ground stop and aircraft are being sent around. This would help prevent this kind of accident, if a mistake is made, the 35' obstacle clearance on an IFR departure would help to insure that there is no issues and hopefully turn a mistake into an incident instead of an accident. Just an idea. This one stings.

It's simpler than that. Just stop allowing multiple simultaneous clearances to the same runway.
Do one at a time. One plane cleared to land; the one first on final. .
One truck cleared to cross; when no planes are also cleared to land.

The simultaneous clearances are the root cause problem.
Without that the other mistakes, of which there were many by both ATC and the truck, would not matter.

[Tbayer2021]

Jesus christ. No matter how blameless you are, there will always be someone looking to blame the pilots.

[DHC-1 Jockey]

It's simpler than that. Just stop allowing multiple simultaneous clearances to the same runway.
Do one at a time. One plane cleared to land; the one first on final. .
One truck cleared to cross; when no planes are also cleared to land.

The simultaneous clearances are the root cause problem. Without that the other mistakes, of which there were many by both ATC and the truck, would not matter.

The multiple landing clearance issue probably isn't as big of an issue in this incident as other high-profile incidents. In this case, it seems like the controller simply forgot that Jazz was short final when he issued the vehicle crossing. In fact, as an ATC in Canada, we are allowed to cross a vehicle after a landing clearance has been issued as long as certain requirements are satisfied (Safe distance exists between the vehicle and aircraft, traffic is passed both ways between the aircraft and the vehicle, the tower controller activating whatever Runway obstruction system they have, etc). While your solution of "One truck cleared to cross; when no planes are also cleared to land" is perfectly reasonable, what if the controller makes the simple mistake of forgetting that there is a plane cleared to land in the first place? This is the human factor that most likely resulted in this crash.

If the human in the control tower forgets that Jazz is out there, or is in a rush and forgets to activate the Runway obstructing system before speaking to the vehicle to issue the crossing instruction, you can see how all the safety systems in the world won't work if the human doesn't use them correctly or forgets that Jazz is there. That's why I drill into my students to activate the Runway obstruction system before sending the vehicle across, because it does no good if you tell the vehicle to cross first and then hit the button to obstruct the runway... at that point it's too late.

I feel for this controller, and can easily see how in a task-saturated environment with the pressure to get the vehicles to the other emergency aircraft, it probably resulted in him forgetting that Jazz was there, and/or forgetting to activate whatever Runway obstruction system they have (which in Canada would make the Jazz strip start flashing in red alerting the controller to their mistake and issuing a STOP to the vehicle much sooner or telling Jazz to go around). I'm sure every tower controller is looking at this situation and can see how it could happen to them too.

[philaviate]

It's simpler than that. Just stop allowing multiple simultaneous clearances to the same runway.
Do one at a time. One plane cleared to land; the one first on final. .
One truck cleared to cross; when no planes are also cleared to land.

The simultaneous clearances are the root cause problem. Without that the other mistakes, of which there were many by both ATC and the truck, would not matter.

The multiple landing clearance issue probably isn't as big of an issue in this incident as other high-profile incidents. In this case, it seems like the controller simply forgot that Jazz was short final when he issued the vehicle crossing. In fact, as an ATC in Canada, we are allowed to cross a vehicle after a landing clearance has been issued as long as certain requirements are satisfied (Safe distance exists between the vehicle and aircraft, traffic is passed both ways between the aircraft and the vehicle, the tower controller activating whatever Runway obstruction system they have, etc). While your solution of "One truck cleared to cross; when no planes are also cleared to land" is perfectly reasonable, what if the controller makes the simple mistake of forgetting that there is a plane cleared to land in the first place? This is the human factor that most likely resulted in this crash.

If the human in the control tower forgets that Jazz is out there, or is in a rush and forgets to activate the Runway obstructing system before speaking to the vehicle to issue the crossing instruction, you can see how all the safety systems in the world won't work if the human doesn't use them correctly or forgets that Jazz is there. That's why I drill into my students to activate the Runway obstruction system before sending the vehicle across, because it does no good if you tell the vehicle to cross first and then hit the button to obstruct the runway... at that point it's too late.

I feel for this controller, and can easily see how in a task-saturated environment with the pressure to get the vehicles to the other emergency aircraft, it probably resulted in him forgetting that Jazz was there, and/or forgetting to activate whatever Runway obstruction system they have (which in Canada would make the Jazz strip start flashing in red alerting the controller to their mistake and issuing a STOP to the vehicle much sooner or telling Jazz to go around). I'm sure every tower controller is looking at this situation and can see how it could happen to them too.

But that's my point, he forgot. Now why did he forget? He forgot because it was a long time ago that he cleared them, because they weren't even on final when he cleared them.
They were #2 and way back from the field.

If he was only able to clear one plane at a time, it would have been much closer to when the truck was asking for clearance that he was having to deal with Jazz's landing clearance.

If planes can only be cleared to land when they are truly #1 and CLEAR to land, then there's a much much much smaller window for errors like this to happen.
That's why this is the ultimate root cause of this. I'm not denying the other errors, I'm just saying they all started from this.

[flieslikeachicken]

Jesus christ. No matter how blameless you are, there will always be someone looking to blame the pilots.

Still not blaming them.

You can do everything right and still hold responsibility for something.

[Hangry]

Jesus christ. No matter how blameless you are, there will always be someone looking to blame the pilots.

Still not blaming them.

You can do everything right and still hold responsibility for something.

Having to be right is the worst trait a pilot can have.

[cdnavater]

After reflecting on this I’ve come to a point where I wonder why the controller didn’t issue a go around for Jazz?
Instead of repeating stop over and over, I read 10 times, when the truck was not stopping, if it was the same controller, it seems to me after the first or even second attempt to stop the truck, the next call should of been to Jazz, “go around”. The audio I listen to sure sounds like the same controller issued a go around to another aircraft but that is yet to be confirmed, so obviously this will be looked at.
We literally train low energy go arounds fairly frequently, often in the flare, anyhow, this may or may not have saved the day and of course hindsight has me pondering if it could have made the difference.

[digits_]

After reflecting on this I’ve come to a point where I wonder why the controller didn’t issue a go around for Jazz?
Instead of repeating stop over and over, I read 10 times, when the truck was not stopping, if it was the same controller, it seems to me after the first or even second attempt to stop the truck, the next call should of been to Jazz, “go around”. The audio I listen to sure sounds like the same controller issued a go around to another aircraft but that is yet to be confirmed, so obviously this will be looked at.
We literally train low energy go arounds fairly frequently, often in the flare, anyhow, this may or may not have saved the day and of course hindsight has me pondering if it could have made the difference.

Looks like the plane touched down in the middle of that stop stop stop transmission.

In retrospect it could have ended much worse as well if the plane did attempt a (failed?) go around at that stage.

[Prodriver]

In thinking about this, maybe when there is an emergency response like there was and the Fire trucks are rolling, to avoid confusion in the Heat off battle, maybe all Landing traffic should be sent around until the Emergency ground traffic is at the maim event.

This simple "Go around instruction", and a 5 minute circuit would protect all involved and help eliminate the human factors that was pointed out by the ATC guy earlier. People make mistakes, lets work to minimizing them, the Pro crews I talk to are always proud of the fact that they are always "Primed to go around and no landing is assured" this is what I have been told and taught. A simple change like this, has almost zero impact on operations and would probably have helped defend against a human factors mistake.

[cdnavater]

After reflecting on this I’ve come to a point where I wonder why the controller didn’t issue a go around for Jazz?
Instead of repeating stop over and over, I read 10 times, when the truck was not stopping, if it was the same controller, it seems to me after the first or even second attempt to stop the truck, the next call should of been to Jazz, “go around”. The audio I listen to sure sounds like the same controller issued a go around to another aircraft but that is yet to be confirmed, so obviously this will be looked at.
We literally train low energy go arounds fairly frequently, often in the flare, anyhow, this may or may not have saved the day and of course hindsight has me pondering if it could have made the difference.

Looks like the plane touched down in the middle of that stop stop stop transmission.

In retrospect it could have ended much worse as well if the plane did attempt a (failed?) go around at that stage.

Yes of course, like I said I wonder, I’m saying it with knowledge of the CRJ, right up to 50’ which if on a stable profile is the runway threshold, a go around is a non event. Below 50’, the thrust is reduced to idle and it becomes a low energy go around, which is trained for, this scenario is a little more precarious as depending on the spool up of the engines, you attempt to remain in ground effect to regain the lost airspeed.
These are all retrospective scenarios and of course the what ifs always come into play, hopefully something changes to make it safer but what is not lost on me and is coincidental, we have lost three CRJ 900 hulls is a little over a year, this is something to ponder a little

[digits_]

In thinking about this, maybe when there is an emergency response like there was and the Fire trucks are rolling, to avoid confusion in the Heat off battle, maybe all Landing traffic should be sent around until the Emergency ground traffic is at the maim event.

This simple "Go around instruction", and a 5 minute circuit would protect all involved and help eliminate the human factors that was pointed out by the ATC guy earlier. People make mistakes, lets work to minimizing them, the Pro crews I talk to are always proud of the fact that they are always "Primed to go around and no landing is assured" this is what I have been told and taught. A simple change like this, has almost zero impact on operations and would probably have helped defend against a human factors mistake.

Wouldn't that result in that same controller dealing with the emergency on the ground plus a bunch of planes going around, each needing attention as well? It might increase the workload instead of decreasing it. I agree it could be safer, but only if one of the root causes (understaffing) is adressed. Otherwise it might make things worse.

[pelmet]

It's simpler than that. Just stop allowing multiple simultaneous clearances to the same runway.
Do one at a time. One plane cleared to land; the one first on final. .
One truck cleared to cross; when no planes are also cleared to land.

The simultaneous clearances are the root cause problem. Without that the other mistakes, of which there were many by both ATC and the truck, would not matter.

The multiple landing clearance issue probably isn't as big of an issue in this incident as other high-profile incidents. In this case, it seems like the controller simply forgot that Jazz was short final when he issued the vehicle crossing. In fact, as an ATC in Canada, we are allowed to cross a vehicle after a landing clearance has been issued as long as certain requirements are satisfied (Safe distance exists between the vehicle and aircraft, traffic is passed both ways between the aircraft and the vehicle, the tower controller activating whatever Runway obstruction system they have, etc). While your solution of "One truck cleared to cross; when no planes are also cleared to land" is perfectly reasonable, what if the controller makes the simple mistake of forgetting that there is a plane cleared to land in the first place? This is the human factor that most likely resulted in this crash.

If the human in the control tower forgets that Jazz is out there, or is in a rush and forgets to activate the Runway obstructing system before speaking to the vehicle to issue the crossing instruction, you can see how all the safety systems in the world won't work if the human doesn't use them correctly or forgets that Jazz is there. That's why I drill into my students to activate the Runway obstruction system before sending the vehicle across, because it does no good if you tell the vehicle to cross first and then hit the button to obstruct the runway... at that point it's too late.

I feel for this controller, and can easily see how in a task-saturated environment with the pressure to get the vehicles to the other emergency aircraft, it probably resulted in him forgetting that Jazz was there, and/or forgetting to activate whatever Runway obstruction system they have (which in Canada would make the Jazz strip start flashing in red alerting the controller to their mistake and issuing a STOP to the vehicle much sooner or telling Jazz to go around). I'm sure every tower controller is looking at this situation and can see how it could happen to them too.

Looking more and more like the primary fault lies with the controller giving a clearance to cross when he should not have done so. But significant fault has to go to the driver of the fire truck. You never, ever cross the runway when the automated red runway status lights are illuminated. These are completely independent of the controller and designed to be a further line of defence against a runway incursion in the event of a controller error(or pilot taxiing/ground equipment driving error).

Canada does not have this RWSL system but we do have tower controlled red hold short lines at certain airports for low visibility ops with clear instructions in the AIM to not cross if illuminated, despite what a controller might clear you to do. I experienced such a situation in YVR once on runway 08R. The actual error was the controller forgetting to turn the hold short lights off but we held short, despite the line-up clearance, until he extinguished the lights.

With regard to RSWL automated lights in the US, I have seen them at quite a few airports. I had an interesting, very slight event one time with them. We had just finished lining up on a runway(which has runways that cross at 90 degrees downfield) and now holding in position. With all items in the cockpit being complete, I looked outside and down the runway, now ready for a takeoff clearance, I was ready to go, once the clearance was received. A few seconds later, I noticed the red runway status centreline lights extinguish, and then a few seconds after that, we got the takeoff clearance. Holy Crap, I thought to myself, I was ready to go, if cleared prior to the red lights extinguishing. These particular lights are different than the hold short of the runway red lights are (and which should be more obvious) but it shows that the lights can be overlooked. I thought to myself that flashing red centerline lights might be more obvious. Lights and lack of lights can be overlooked as we saw when that RJ took off from a short runway at night with no runway lighting and crashed.

The last thing is the poor airmanship of the truck driver. Despite ATC clearance and even if the RWSL lights were to not be illuminated, you always deliberately look both ways down the runway and further along onto both final approaches before crossing a runway. The landing lights of an airliner will be obvious. In this case, you also had a driver in an elevated state of anxiety as there was an emergency, and we all know that when in a rush, mistakes are more likely.

Bottom line....if you have RWSL lights, you need three things to cross the runway(and might be good to brief this): ATC clearance, lack of red lights and looking in both directions prior to crossing.

[rudder]

Preliminary NTSB report:

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/ ... 202674/pdf

[digits_]

Preliminary NTSB report:

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/ ... 202674/pdf

Looks like the RELs were operating properly and the truck ignored/missed them?

[pelmet]

Preliminary NTSB report:

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/ ... 202674/pdf

Looks like the RELs were operating properly and the truck ignored/missed them?

If I read the report correctly for the RWSL system, there is no red stop bar perpendicular to the taxiway. What they did have were taxiway centreline lights and the red lights that are also on the centreline. It appears that they had the same situation that I encountered in my last post, a situation where red lights can end up not being noticed.

In addition, it appears that the other trucks in the group did what all people cleared across a runway should do…..look and make sure that they don’t see an aircraft that is a threat. Therefore, despite all trucks being cleared to cross, only one entered the runway.

[BTD]

Preliminary NTSB report:

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/ ... 202674/pdf

Looks like the RELs were operating properly and the truck ignored/missed them?

If I read the report correctly for the RWSL system, there is no red stop bar perpendicular to the taxiway. What they did have were taxiway centreline lights and the red lights that are also on the centreline. It appears that they had the same situation that I encountered in my last post, a situation where red lights can end up not being noticed.

In addition, it appears that the other trucks in the group did what all people cleared across a runway should do…..look and make sure that they don’t see an aircraft that is a threat. Therefore, despite all trucks being cleared to cross, only one entered the runway.

That is how all RWSL setups are configured. Along the centreline of each taxiway that crosses a runway and along the centreline of the runway at the threshold for when aircraft cross downfield.

[digits_]

Preliminary NTSB report:

https://data.ntsb.gov/carol-repgen/api/ ... 202674/pdf

Looks like the RELs were operating properly and the truck ignored/missed them?

If I read the report correctly for the RWSL system, there is no red stop bar perpendicular to the taxiway. What they did have were taxiway centreline lights and the red lights that are also on the centreline. It appears that they had the same situation that I encountered in my last post, a situation where red lights can end up not being noticed.

Ah yes you're right. That shounds like a horrible design... Very easy to miss in a sea of lights...