AA B-757 overrun at Jackson Hole (WY) during recent snow storm

[Fog]

I haven't seen a post on this subject on Air Warriors, so I thought I'd ask pilots in general & those flying now for airlines in particular their opinions on the wisdom of American Airlines having flight crews take a 757 into Jackson Hole (w/ a 6,300 ft runway) in the Winter season. I believe the general rule-of-thumb for 737 ops is a runway of 7,000 ft - so to take a bigger a/c into a mountainous airport during the Winter seems to be an onerous burden for desk-types to put on aircrews for what must be the sole purpose of it having a larger passenger payload. I just hope no one at AA's HQ tries to hang the aircrew for the result of what their scheduling set-up to happen. I've taken an American 757 there in good WX during a Summer fishing trip. and - believe me - it used all the available runway. American has a bunch of 737-800s which seat almost as many pax, so I don't think the reward in this case was worth the risk. Curious as to what others think.

 

[gparks1989]

I haven't seen a post on this subject on Air Warriors, so I thought I'd ask pilots in general & those flying now for airlines in particular their opinions on the wisdom of American Airlines having flight crews take a 757 into Jackson Hole (w/ a 6,300 ft runway) in the Winter season. I believe the general rule-of-thumb for 737 ops is a runway of 7,000 ft - so to take a bigger a/c into a mountainous airport during the Winter seems to be an onerous burden for desk-types to put on aircrews for what must be the sole purpose of it having a larger passenger payload. I just hope no one at AA's HQ tries to hang the aircrew for the result of what their scheduling set-up to happen. I've taken an American 757 there in good WX during a Summer fishing trip. and - believe me - it used all the available runway. American has a bunch of 737-800s which seat almost as many pax, so I don't think the reward in this case was worth the risk. Curious as to what others think.

Delta, United and AA all fly 757's into JAC. United and Delta also use A319's. Also, Cheney flew Air Force 2 in all the time. I've been coming to JAC for 17 years and this is the first I've heard of a commercial plane overrunning the runway. From the news reports seems as though the brakes failed. Report from the pilots was that braking condition on the runway was good. I believe one of the appeals of flying the 757 into Jackson is its climb performance? Please correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[BigIron]

Here's a vid of the incident:

I'm not associated with big wing commercial aviation, so I don't know if the narration points in the above vid are valid at all.

 

[Pugs]

American is in a bit of a mess on this right now as their maint crews downloaded the FDR data before the NTSB could. That's a big no-no and the NTSB is excluding them from the investigation over it. Have no clue if it was an error or on purpose but the rules are well known.

 

[wink]

Yup, B757 preferred for its performance, especially in climb. There are special procedures used in JAC due to the terrain. At many airports it isn't runway length that limits you, it is terrain and obstacles after take off. Remember, you don't have to load up every seat on the plane and fill the tanks with gas. The aircraft is loaded to perform more then adequately given the particular airport and atmospheric conditions at the time. A B737-800 full of gas and people isn't going to work at JAC any better then a full up B757. Neither one would make it in most condition. But a B757 may be able to take the equivalent of a B737-800 worth of people and just enough gas to make it to DFW (much less than a full load) and be able to get off that runway no problem and have better climb performance if an engine fails.

 

[A4sForever]

American Airlines is a professional organization ... if the bird was dispatched into the field -- then it met the minimums or some ground-pounder will fry. The crew STILL has to x-check the landing data and agree or disagree. As to flying, if the crew fucked it up, then they will fry.

But the pilots have the 'ultimate' responsibility. I don't always 'agree' w/ the book solution, but that's what it is ... more to the point, I've refused a dispatch and/or a 'sanctioned' landing more than once during my airline career -- as long as I could justify it, it was no problem in the post-mortem.

Too many flyin'-guys don't cover their "6" and take whatever is given them ... but you STILL have to consider YOUR limitations/capabilities as well as what's 'legal' or 'what's in the book' ... YOU are the 'guy' that's there ... no one else.

In a short-hair situation (i.e., @ < 8000' of runway w/ winds, a wet, clutter runway proposition and a NO TAILHOOK jet???) ... I choose to err of the side of safety while accomplishing the 'mission' and promoting a measure of flyin'-career self-preservation.

 

[eas7888]

One thing about the "Book" numbers. One thing I've been told about the numbers in the "Book" since the day I started flying is that those numbers come from test pilot, flying a nearly new aircraft. What I take from that is that I may never be able to reach those numbers for a couple of reasons. Either I won't have the experience of the test pilot, or the aircraft I'm flying will not be able to meet the same standards as that new aircraft used to test the numbers over a decade ago.

I'm not saying I'm a defeatist, and I won't try to achieve those numbers every time I land or take off, because I do. I'm just saying that I choose to err on the side of caution when it comes to calculated values from the book.

 

[FrankTheTank]

FEDEX Minimum Runway Length for Release

B727
5,000 Feet

B757
5,000 Feet

B777
6,500 Feet

A300/310
5,700 Feet

MD-11 & MD-10
7,000 Feet

We bring our Airbuses daily into Burbank, John Wayne, Long Beach, Baton Rouge, and few other short runway facilities.

Like others have said, it's Take-off that is the problem more so than landing (Especially with Medium Auto Brakes on Landing- [A330/310]) :icon_wink

 

[Kaman]

This may very well be a case of the crew doing everything reasonable and correct, yet some variable might have bitten them. Southwest had a similar mishap in Chicago-Midway with a 737-700 going off the end and thru the airport fence into the road. At the time Southwest was new to the use to autobrakes, "difficult" (late TR deployment), contaminated runway and required landing distance was based upon Thrust Reverser credit whereas it should have only considered brakes...(autobrake setting might have been a factor). They were "in the zone, on-speed and on the centerline". Again, a combination of factors lead to the SWA accident and I am certain the same will be true with AA in Jackson Hole. American is a very professional organization, but they are leading the league with 121 pax hull losses and FedEX on the cargo side...Very interesting indeed. AA lost two airplanes as a direct result of POOR CRM (Cali and Little Rock), both of those were also attributed to a loss of basic airmanship skills as well. No one is immune to "Stupid pilot tricks".