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| This thread is really getting to be rather pointless without pictures.
Here's the airfield seen looking west down the parallel taxiway in question, and runway 29. | |
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FTFY
I must confess my heart goes out to the crew; yes, they pretty clearly f***ed-up bigtime, but being flown home as SLC "temporarily relieved of duties pending investigation" is a real dismal experience
On the "positive" side, no injuries or damage, let alone fatalities...
I remember one winter's night, cold but clear, (
Help, I'm sounding like Wolli again!

) many years ago at Luton, out for a wee night/instrument sortie to blow the cobwebs off.
Turned into a bit of a faff, since the main taxiway was closed for the night and a lot of heavy equipment was working on it, and aircraft were having to backtrack on the runway, since the taxiway was obviously u/s.
I was waiting for departure, trying hard not to think of the mounting cost of sitting there all revved up and nowhere to go, when heard on the radio "Britannia XXX - Go Around."
Hmmm. Several seconds silence (seemed much longer tho'!).
Again "Britannia XXX - GO AROUND", immediately followed by ""Britannia XXX - Going around".
Big bird thunders overhead shortly after, as instructed. Interesting, thinks I, but get called up almost straight after to confirm I'm still good to go, so out and off we go into the calm black yonder... On the radio, I hear Britannia XXX hauling its ass round the sky, and making it in on the next attempt.
Pottered around a bit, then back into the circuit, shot some visual then some instrument approaches, then in for a full-stop with a surveillance radar approach (
well, I was lonely by then, and wanted someone to talk to..)
Ran like clockwork, if I say so myself, then taxi back in, park up and off to the club bar for a well-earned beer and catch up on the gossip
The Gossip turned out to be that Britannia XXX was waved off by an alert controller who had spotted that they were actually lined up on the taxiway, not the runway. Goodness knows how, but the crew had managed to "see" the lights on all the heavy plant as runway lights and were heading straight into it
And I had been sitting on a crossway somewhere in the middle of it all
There but for the etc...