MDW Runway Incursion

[Pinecone]

Sort of like the old routine that the comedian Gallagher did.  Give every driver a suction dart with "dumb a**" darts  Someone does something stupid, you tag them with a dart.  If a cop see a vehicle with some number of darts or more, he pulls them over and gives them a ticket for being a "dumb a**" driver.

[ttflyer]

10 hours ago, Pinecone said:

Problem is, that causes the offending airplane to be stuck ON the runway.

I think that a big part of this will be the crew not realizing they had crossed one runway and either thought the second was the first or just did not realize that were crossing at all, forgetting that they were on a runway, so no lines and flashing lights.

This exactly.  Give these guys a bit of a break. Yes, they Fd'up.  But Midway is a mess on the ground.  They were given a clearance to cross a runway that barely looks like a runway while they were on a runway. They lost SA and didn't look like they should have but plenty of professional pilots could have made this mistake. In fact I have yet to meet a professional pilot that hasn't made a mistake...

Also, I'll bet SWA saw that whole thing unfolding right in front of them with plenty of time to react.  "Is that guy REALLY gonna pull out in front of us?  Yup? Oh well, around we go". Not great but I doubt the drama is warranted... 

[EricJ]

42 minutes ago, ttflyer said:

In fact I have yet to meet a professional pilot that hasn't made a mistake...

We had an additional parallel taxiway added at our airport a couple years ago, and it's taken me a bit to get used to, especially since I usually fly from the other side of the airport.   I got put in ATC taxi timeout once (told to hold short of the runway for "wake turbulence" behind a bunch of landing Archers) after I wound up on the wrong taxiway.   This is at my home airport.

I was describing this during an organizational check ride with a retired pilot who'd spent a lifetime flying the airlines, including more than a decade in 747s flying globally, and how I thought navigating taxiways was the hardest part of flying.   He thought so, too, and just said, "Don't worry about it, *everybody* gets lost."  It did make me feel better about it.

So, yeah, an understandable and relatable mistake, but still a dangerous one.   The little ones can get you the worst.   This is not a forgiving process, unfortunately.

[Hank]

1 hour ago, ttflyer said:

This exactly.  Give these guys a bit of a break. Yes, they Fd'up.  But Midway is a mess on the ground . . . plenty of professional pilots could have made this mistake. In fact I have yet to meet a professional pilot that hasn't made a mistake...

 

1 hour ago, EricJ said:

I was describing this during an organizational check ride with a retired pilot who'd spent a lifetime flying the airlines, including more than a decade in 747s flying globally, and how I thought navigating taxiways was the hardest part of flying.   He thought so, too, and just said, "Don't worry about it, *everybody* gets lost." 

The new Sec. Transportation thinks pilots who blow taxi instructions like this should lose their license . . . Kind of like revoking taxi and truck driver's licenses for making a bad lane change . . .

Sometimes the ground layout is confusing, sometimes the taxi instructions are unclear.

If a bad taxi means loss of license, what will happen if a pilot flies off of his clearance? Bust Bravo, turn right instead of left, climb through cleared altitude, fly through localized, etc.?

[bigmo]

This was a bit more than a bad taxi. Cat A's could have gone either way and that SWA crew could have easily not seen them during their approach (I mean they have a plane to land). Had they selected thrust reversers,, they'd have met that Challenger at 100 knots. 

I'm not God's gift to flying by any means. I am a pilot by trade and treat every airfield as if it's the first time I'm there no matter how familiar. Likening this to a bad lane change is a bit of a silly argument as a lane change won't result in the deaths of 200 people. These guys were confused from the start. Time to stop, clarify, and focus on the task at hand. At least look at the darn signage - all those words and numbers have meaning. 

Not sure if their ticket should be pulled - but I'd sure not fly with them. Ever. 

We (as a community) have been very lucky for far too long. Last year, the FedEx-SWA near miss was just as bad. If I recall that was controller error. I'm a big fan of a technology mitigation solution for 121. Fund it through a buck or two per pax.

[201er]

3 hours ago, ttflyer said:

This exactly.  Give these guys a bit of a break. Yes, they Fd'up.  But Midway is a mess on the ground.  They were given a clearance to cross a runway that barely looks like a runway while they were on a runway. They lost SA and didn't look like they should have but plenty of professional pilots could have made this mistake. In fact I have yet to meet a professional pilot that hasn't made a mistake...

 

[skykrawler]

Seems like  22L is used as the main runway and 22R is being used as a taxiway (like the closed runway taxiway H) or maybe only take-offs.

There should be holding lines or WIGWAG lights on 4L/22R at that crossing - like they have for 13R crossing 22L and 22R.   Do they even have runway signs at that intersection?

I can see it being very easy to miss.    It requires the discipline to follow the taxi route on a chart and verify progress.

I think the controller confused them when a switched from referring to 22R to 4L - the initial clearance was to hold short of 22R.

[Pinecone]

On 2/28/2025 at 10:14 PM, Hank said:

Sometimes the ground layout is confusing, sometimes the taxi instructions are unclear.

And sometimes the tower screws up.

Landed runway 11 at KCAE.  Was off at A5, told taxi Alpha to Echo 2 to ramp.   DL lands and turns off an Bravo and told to taxi Bravo, Alpha to terminal.  Hmm, that puts me ESE bound on Alpha and him WNW on Alpha.  Luckily tower saw and stopped him on Bravo and I was able to turn to the FBO.  I was wondering how one of us was going to back up.

 

[Hank]

1 hour ago, Pinecone said:

And sometimes the tower screws up.

Landed runway 11 at KCAE.  Was off at A5, told taxi Alpha to Echo 2 to ramp.   DL lands and turns off an Bravo and told to taxi Bravo, Alpha to terminal.  Hmm, that puts me ESE bound on Alpha and him WNW on Alpha.  Luckily tower saw and stopped him on Bravo and I was able to turn to the FBO.  I was wondering how one of us was going to back up.

Well, if you don't have beta, he has thrust reversers, which you would see as strong headwinds . . . .  

[Yetti]

On 2/26/2025 at 7:18 AM, A64Pilot said:

Our Tesla won’t at least with FSD engaged, I haven’t tried to run a light manually driving, I think it won’t, but haven’t tried. If a sign isn’t where it’s supposed to be it won’t recognize it though, for instance being a fly-in neighborhood our roads are taxiways, as such the stop signs are well off to the side and real close to the ground for wing clearance, the Tesla ignores them. Most outside drivers, Fedex and the like also don’t see them

Just very recently FSD has gotten VERY good, I still don’t trust it, but it’s light years better than it was just a year ago. Cyber cab is supposed to go live in Austin this Summer. I don’t think it’s good enough myself yet, but we will see. It’s real close though, maybe Cybercab will get special software?

I test drove a Cybertruck a couple of months ago.    The FSD tried to make a left turn out of the middle lane.   So I took over and went straight.  To be fair it was a construction zone and lanes may have shifted recently.

It did pretty well on the high way.    Not sure about letting traffic merge.    The Ford and Subaru are bad about letting in cars merge in.

It did pull out in front of a car on a side street.  Not sure if the car was blinking to turn right, but I had to take over.

It did get stuck making a left turn onto a busy street from a side street.    I had to take over and do a Right turn then a U turn.

The two biggest things were, I really did not know were I was or how to get back to the dealer, because I did not Navigate to the super charger.

There seems to be a reliance on cameras/screens for visibility.  so you end up looking at the screen, but then FSD penalizes you for taking the eyes off the road.  

Not sure how you handle these issues if you are a passenger in a self driving taxi.

Several times I found myself talking to the car telling it how that was not going to work

 

Edited 27 minutes ago by Yetti