Southern California airports have worst runway safety records

http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/...printstory.jsp

Southern California airports have worst runway safety records

IAN GREGOR
Associated Press

LOS ANGELES - Los Angeles International Airport and two others nearby
have the worst runway safety records among the nation's busiest
airports in recent years, a review of federal aviation data shows.

Federal officials are most concerned by the situation at bustling LAX,
where commercial jets have come perilously close to crashing at least
twice since 1999, the first year of data reviewed by The Associated
Press.

The problem persists because, despite millions spent to reduce
violations known as runway incursions, LAX's airfield has built-in
flaws: It's too tightly packed and arriving aircraft must cross
runways used for takeoffs.

Nationwide, the number of incursions has dropped about 20 percent from
its 2001 peak. Airports in Boston, Philadelphia and Newark had
unusually high numbers of incursions in fiscal year 2005; those in
Denver, San Francisco and New York's La Guardia had none, according to
federal records.

While other airports periodically make headlines, federal attention
....
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Los Angeles -- Long Beach Airport, Los Angeles International and John
Wayne airports have the worst runway safety records among the nation's
busiest airports in recent years, a review of the federal aviation
data shows.

Officials at Long Beach Airport say their incursions predominately
involve smaller, private planes. -- with only one linked to a
commercial passenger airline in the last year. A network of five
runways, all intersecting at various points, is the problem, officials
said. Runway incursions occur when a p...
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Incursions highest in three SoCal airports

Southern California airports have the nation's worst runway safety
records. Airports in Orange County and Long Beach led the nation in
runway incursion rates since 1999, followed by LAX.

INCURSIONS RATE PER 100,000 FLIGHTS
---------- ------------------------
Los Angeles 58 John Wayne 1.6
John Wayne 44 Long Beach 1.56
Long Beach 43 Los Angeles 1.18
Chicago 42 Boston 1.18
Phoenix 39 Philadelphia 1.05
Boston 38 Phoenix 0.93
Philadelphia 35 Newark 0.91
Dallas-Ft. Worth 35 San Francisco 0.81
Atlanta 29 JFK 0.72
Newark 28 Las Vegas 0.69

SOURCE: Federal Aviation Administration:
http://www.faa.gov/runwaysafety/pdf/report5.pdf

GENERAL AVIATION OPERATIONS, as defined in this report, comprise all
aviation activities other than military and scheduled air service
(airlines). From FY 2001 through FY 2004, general aviation operations
accounted for approximately 57 percent of all aircraft operations in
the NAS. ...

Summary and Conclusions
[ATC} Operational Errors/Deviations—During the four-year period,
operational errors/deviations accounted for 25 percent of all runway
incursions (352 of 1,395 incursions). Since FY 2002, there has been a
29 percent increase in the number and 34 percent increase in the rate
of operational errors/deviations. FY 2004 had the highest number of
operational errors/deviations of the four-year period. This was the
only runway incursion type that showed an increasing trend in the
number and rate. This upward trend was mostly attributable to an
increase in Category C operational errors/deviations. The most serious
incursions, Category A and B, increased slightly in each of the last
two fiscal years.The FAA has implemented technologies, such as AMASS,
to prevent runway collisions and is beginning to implement ASDE-X to
aid air traffic controllers in their awareness of aircraft position on
the surface. The FAA is also implementing team resource management
training

The chart on page 39 of the report indicates that ORD had the highest
number of ATC Operational Errors and Vehicle/Pedestrian related runway
incursions.

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http://www.latimes.com/news/printedi...,2013412.story

November 24, 2005

Close Calls on LAX Runways High Despite Attempts to Reduce Them
The FAA is pushing a $1.5-billion plan to improve safety by altering
the airport's layout. But objections have stalled the project.

By Jennifer Oldham, Times Staff Writer

Years of efforts to improve runway safety at Los Angeles International
Airport have failed to reduce close calls between airplanes on its
four busy runways, a Times review of federal records shows.

Millions of dollars have been spent to install signs and paint
markings on the airfield to guide pilots as they navigate the closely
spaced runways. Maps have been created for pilots to highlight danger
spots.

Still, pilots and controllers at LAX continue to violate federal rules
that allow only one plane on a runway at a time. Since May, six close
calls have been reported.

The head of the Federal Aviation Administration, saying the world's
fifth-busiest airport is running out of options, believes the best
solution is to begin work "without delay" to reconfigure the two sets
of parallel runways. The plan, which could cost up to $1.5 billion,
has been stymied for years by opposition.

"It's very hard to exaggerate the seriousness of the runway safety
problem here," said FAA Administrator Marion Blakey during a recent
interview in the tower at LAX. "I don't know of anything else we could
do at LAX short of pushing the southern runway south and doing the
same thing, frankly, on the north."

About 80% of the close calls between aircraft at LAX occur on the
busier south side after pilots land on the outer runway and use
taxiways to cross the inner runway on their way to the terminals.
Among the nation's airports, LAX is unusual because airplanes cross
active runways about 900 times a day. ...