www.CostaRicaTicas.com

An Iberia flight from Madrid had a close call last Sunday while landing at SJO. Apparently the plane even struck the top of the fence! According to The Tico Times, the pilot initially tried to land on a runway for planes coming in from the east, but changed course to land on another runway used by flights approaching from the west.

http://www.smh.com.au/world/iberia-flig ... k4un7.html

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"In a nation ruled by swine, all pigs are upwardly mobile, and the rest of us are phucked until we can put our acts together; not necessarily to win, but mainly to keep from losing completely"...Hunter S. Thompson (RIP)

This actually happened last Sunday, the day I left SJO.

mh

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mh

not sure it was really close
appears the flight path was still solid and they would have landed

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im way deep into nothing special
riding the crest of a wave breaking just west of hollywood

Coincidentally, I was booked on an Iberia Flight from Madrid to SJO on September 28th but cancelled due to health issues.

There's only 1 runway at SJO. And most of the time all planes take off and land from the same side, into the wind. Planes don't take off or land with a tail wind unless there's no other options, it's dangerous and the plane doesn't fly as well. This "article" is full of inaccurate info.

Totally right orange....there's never been "another" runway at santamaria airport, unless they are referring to the taxiway

What they meant was he turned 180 to land in the opposite direction due to the diagonal wind shear. That should be obvious to anyone that knows the airport. And to anyone else, they just assume there is a separate runway for opposite traffic. But the purpose of the article is the same.

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bypassin' kinky, and usin' the whole chicken!!!

Not assuming anything, the article says a separate runway:
"According to The Tico Times, the pilot initially tried to land on a runway for planes coming in from the east, but changed course to land on another runway used by flights approaching from the west."

One runway will have two different numbers, for example, at SJO you have only ONE runway but it is called runway 07 and runway 25. The two names are because runways around the world are numbered according to the heading you are on when you are about to take off so you can double check you are on the right runway. So at SJO, runway 07 (taking off toward the east) has a magnetic heading of 69 degrees. However, if the wind is blowing from the west, you'd take off toward the west on runway 25 which has a magnetic heading of 249 degrees.

The most common approach is done from the west landing on runway 07, however, if the wind switches, you will have to make the 'great circle approach' and land on runway 25...but they are the same piece of concrete.

http://www.fltplan.com/AwMainSearchToAi ... ZEFLAG=BIG

http://ww1.jeppesen.com/documents/aviat ... C/MROC.pdf

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Thanks for the detailed and clear technical explanation...I learned something new!

The article is poorly written, though

"Diagonal" wind shear? That's a new term for me. Did you mean crosswind? But if there's a crosswind on runway 7, there will also be a crosswind on 25, just from the opposite side. This runway change would work if there was a perpendicular runway where the angle relative to the wind would change.

The only time they will switch the approach/departure end of any runway due to wind is if the wind shifts and the headwind turns into a tailwind creating a dangerous condition. Every pilot know (or should know) how to land in a crosswind that is within the plane's limits. If they don't, they shouldn't even be flying a SPAM can around because that's one of the most fundamental skills you need to be proficient at as a pilot.

+1 exactly.

The reason is that RWY 7 had ILS which helps them land in shitty weather/visibility, typical during the rainy season where clouds could be as low as 200-300 feet.

Runway 7 is a much easier approach and like Orange said, the ILS is a big help not to mention the straight in approach from 20 miles out. Runway 25 is a totally different story with no ILS system mainly due to the fact you don't actually align with the runway until the last couple of miles at an altitude less than 500 feet. Here is a good video of what it looks like to land on 25 (on what I call the great circle approach) as the Iberia A340 did.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tn_sHql7hw

You might notice, they come out of the turn about a minute before landing...not a lot of time to adjust your glide-slope which was definitely low on the Iberia flight.

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The only thing that matters is happiness in all it forms...

Nitpicking again, huh? I was not using a 'term', I was applying two distinct adjectives to describe a very specific crosswind situation, where the crosswind is not 90 degrees from the runway (which is the only case you described above), but where the angle can be made more than 90 degrees to facilitate a higher headwind (as you describe).

I appreciate the explanation of PVT on the runway identifiers. It is possible that whomever wrote the article simply saw the description as aborted on 7 and landed on 25, and reported it as such.

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bypassin' kinky, and usin' the whole chicken!!!

Not trying to nitpick BD, but in aviation, the term wind shear isn't at all what you are trying to describe and hence, difficulty with people understanding. Wind shear (in aviation) is a term used to describe a rapid change in wind directions and the effect it has on flight.

Wind shear usually happens with a thunderstorm which has a significant downdraft (micro-burst). The downdraft hit the ground and 'ripples' out. So, in a case like the Delta L1011 that crashed at DFW in the late 80s, the airplane flew into the wind shear with a significant headwind. As they went through the micro-burst, the wind changed into a significant tailwind in a matter of seconds causing a loss of lift and a crash.

Here is a great video of a micro-burst in the desert. When you watch, think about what it would be like to fly into one side with a huge headwind then all the sudden, seeing that become a big tailwind as you fly through the center. The change in wind direction is the 'wind shear'.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_G2KRzha7o

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The only thing that matters is happiness in all it forms...