4 ms·

The top of the article: > ‘As bad as it gets without body bags.’ > Why the Austin airport situation was so dangerous. Because the planes almost collided. But

• hitekker 4y ago
  The author didn't point fingers at anyone. He was explicit that the investigators will do the job of finding out the "why". His tone is entirely appropriate given that, if the FedEx operators had not went above and beyond, we would have seen a mass casualty event at Austin's airport. Accusing the author of blaming individuals is rather silly when you're rushing to blame training/procedures/the system.
  • xpe 4y ago
    > The author didn't point fingers at anyone. I didn't say he did. (I was referring to comments here on HN.)
  • xpe 4y ago
    > ... blaming individuals is rather silly when you're rushing to blame training/procedures/the system. I see your point. I am not ruling out individual culpability. Still, by the time a person is in a cockpit or a control tower, they have a history, a record of performance. It is part of the system's responsibility to evaluate this record. So I am less likely to blame an individual only, because to do so would require the individual to act in a way that no system could predict, mitigate, or compensate for.
• dang 4y ago
  OK, I've replaced the title with the first subtitle, which may not cover the entire article but at least is more accurate.
• michaelmrose 4y ago
  Who is saying that procedures allow one plane to take off when one is "3 miles out" or 65 seconds out at a very conservative estimate of a reasonable speed. This isn't a lack of attention or coordination. He literally decided that one plane could take off in that space and repeatedly confirmed this decision.
  • hattmall 4y ago
    That seems in line with what happens though. There's less than a minute, normally around 40 seconds between movements, a take off and landing. To casual observer it seems close of course but it appears the delay from the southwest crew was the issue. Then it's complicated by the lack of visibility from the tower because the controller couldn't detect the delay and issue appropriate commands.
    • bagels 4y ago
      Nearly billion dollar jets and they can't slap a gps on them to see that they're sitting on the runway.
      • bigiain 4y ago
        I see aircraft (and even airport ground vehicles) on the runway all the time on my ADS-B setup. They 100% have them, just nobody was looking at them at the right time.
        • kqr 4y ago
          I find that in stressful and risky situations people stop trusting the data in front of them. They want to believe things are alright and will keep looking for new pieces of information to confirm that, while downplaying the importance of contradictory information.
          • moring 4y ago
            Do you know how true this is for (relatively) reliable systems such as those found in aviation? I know that in everyday life, what you say is absolutely true -- I definitely stop trusting electronic systems in stressful situations -- but then I also know how they feed me misleading as well as blatantly false data all the time, so I'd argue that not trusting them is not irrational per se.
• ekianjo 4y ago
  > he write-up doesn’t answer the key ”why” question —- why are existing procedures and training not suitable? This will be the job of the investigators but it sounds like obvious tower control human operator error.
  • hef19898 4y ago
    Listening to the radio traffic, everybody stayed super cool and chill throughoit this, including the ATC. All the way until FedEx cleared the runway, at which point the ATC showed some emotion in his voice. The FedEx pilots again stayed super chill. That's what coolness and professionalism during pressure and under stress looks like.
  • Fatnino 4y ago
    It could be the fault of the southwest crew for dallying on the runway when there was an incoming jet. Had they gone immediately they would have been long gone by the time FedEx tried to land.
    • zaarn 4y ago
      The pilots take off when they take off. If their take-off clearance isn't obviously time limited, they are certainly allowed to take their time. If they rush the take-off they might skip crucial items from their checklists in the haste, we learned that lesson the hard way already. Or what would have happened had the southwest jet had an issue on take off and had to reject? There is a number of reasons to reject a take off before decision speed that will take the plane down the rest of the runway on full brakes.
    • ekianjo 4y ago
      The tower control is there to tell planes what to do, not to leave judgment to the pilots.
  • blantonl 4y ago
    It was without a doubt a performance problem with the tower controller. FedEx deserves all the credit for avoiding a disaster. As soon as they got their clearance to land, they called back to clarify and verify it. So, they knew that this was going to be a close one, and you can bet that they were ready to go around and abort the landing before they every broke out below minimums and saw the Southwest on the roll. FedEx knew it was going to be ugly, and they were already ready for the go around.
• blantonl 4y ago
  It is well known in the ATC community that this tower controller that was responsible for this incident was a problem child. He had been shuttled multiple times between facilities as a poor performer and was well known for filling EO complaints against the FAA for performance actions taken against him.
  • CyberKimura 4y ago
    So it's someone crying racism every time they are disciplined. A position that can kill tons of people with one wrong move should not be able to do this.
    • xpe 4y ago
      On what basis are you saying this? Please, let's not jump to conclusions without evidence.