Virgin Australia AT72 at Moranbah on Mar 5th 2014, landed on runway occupied by aerodrome safety vehicle

Last Update: June 17, 2014 / 15:36:07 GMT/Zulu time

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Incident Facts

Date of incident
Mar 5, 2014

Classification
Incident

Flight number
XR-1665

Aircraft Registration
VH-FVI

Aircraft Type
ATR ATR-72-200

ICAO Type Designator
AT72

A Virgin Australia Regional Avions de Transport Regional ATR-72-500, registration VH-FVI performing flight XR-1665 from Brisbane,QL to Moranbah,QL (Australia), landed on Moranbah's runway 16 although an aerodrome safety vehicle was on the runway. The crew managed to bring the aircraft to a safe stop.

Australia's TSB have opened an investigation into the runway occurrence rated a serious incident stating they are looking especially into air-ground communication. Both crew and driver of the vehicle reported not hearing any radio calls.

The incident aircraft was able to perform the return flight XR-1666 on schedule.



On Jun 17th 2014 the ATSB released their final bulletin releasing following safety message:

The ATSB SafetyWatch highlights the broad safety concerns that come out of our investigation findings and from the occurrence data reported to us by industry. One of the safety concerns is safety around non-controlled aerodromes .

Research conducted by the ATSB found that, between 2003 and 2008, 32 runway incursions were recorded at non-towered aerodromes. Broadcasting on and monitoring of the CTAF is the key way for pilots to establish situational and traffic awareness. The ATSB Limitations of the see-and-avoid principle study found that the effectiveness of a search for other traffic is eight times greater when a radio is used effectively in combination with a visual lookout, than when no radio is used. A pilot’s guide to staying safe in the vicinity of non-towered aerodromes is available at .

The aircraft was number two on approach to Moranbah on a downwind to conduct a NDB approach to runway 16, when number one touched down on Moranbah's runway 16 and reported a bird strike. As result the aerodrome reporting officer left the airport terminal building walking about 200 meters to the safety vehicle and drove the vehicle, with orange flashing lights turned on, to the threshold of runway 16 and broadcast on the CTAF that he was about to enter the runway receiving a "beep back" message confirming he had made his call correctly, but no other transmission was heard on the frequency. The officer assumed the beep back rather than a voice back message was correct due the radio traffic the landing traffic had generated (if there had been no voice communication in the last 5 minutes the CTAF would confirm a transmission with a voice back message rather than a beep back message).

The officer then checked the approach for any arriving aircraft, did not detect any arriving traffic and entered the runway to conduct the inspection for possible bird debris. When reaching the end of the runway he turned the vehicle around and drove back on the runway finding no evidence of a bird strike.

In the meantime the ATR had turned final and was on final approach in cloud, after breaking clear of the cloud the aircraft encountered turbulence. When the captain looked out of the cockpit at about 20 feet AGL, he spotted the vehicle near the far end of the runway, about the touch down zone markers of runway 04, and immediately broadcast "car vacate!" The driver heard the call, noticed the aircraft in his rear mirrors and sped to vacate the runway then broadcast that he had vacated all runways.

The ATSB commented that in post flight interviews the captain made his call to continue the landing based on the assessment, that the car was beyond the braking distance needed to stop the aircraft, in case of a go-around he had needed to take control of the aircraft from the first officer who was pilot flying, the aircraft would have touched down and needed to become airborne again and then climb over the car. He determined that there was less risk in continuing the landing than attempting to go around.

The ATSB reported that between the call of the ATR crew to be overhead of the aerodrome and the call "car vacate" were 6 minutes. The Aerodrome Reporting Officer was not required to continuously monitor the frequency. The recordings of the frequency contained both the calls by the ATR crew and the officer's calls. It could not be determined why the ATR crew did not hear the calls by the aerodrome reporting officer.
Incident Facts

Date of incident
Mar 5, 2014

Classification
Incident

Flight number
XR-1665

Aircraft Registration
VH-FVI

Aircraft Type
ATR ATR-72-200

ICAO Type Designator
AT72

This article is published under license from Avherald.com. © of text by Avherald.com.
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