ACRP Report 3: Analysis of aircraft overruns and undershoots for runway safety areas

Abstract

ACRP Report 3: Analysis of Aircraft Overruns and Undershoots for Runway Safety Areas\ncovers four areas: (1) Research collected on accident/incident data from several notable\nsources; (2) inventory of the conditions relating to each; (3) assessment of risk in relation\nto the runway safety area; and (4) discussion on a set of alternatives to the traditional runway\nsafety area.\nOverruns and undershoots are factors in the design or improvement of runway safety\nareas (RSAs). The traditional approach to mitigate risk associated with accidents or incidents\nis to enlarge the runway safety area, but many airports do not have sufficient land\nto accommodate standard Federal Aviation Administration or International Civil Aviation\nOrganization recommendations for RSAs. Airports that pursue this approach face\nextremely expensive and controversial land acquisition or wetlands filling projects to make\nsufficient land available.\nThis report uses a probabilistic approach—a quantitative assessment—to analyze the\nRSA and begins a discussion on how alternatives to a standard 1,000-foot RSA may adequately\nmitigate risk. The report also assesses the factors that increase the risk of such accidents\noccurring, helps with understanding how these incidents may happen, and suggests\nthat aircraft overrun and undershoot risks are related to specific operational factors.\nThe report suggests that significant improvement to airport operations safety may be\nachieved by monitoring and managing these operational factors for both RSA planning and\nduring actual aircraft operations, and it provides recommendations for collection and\nreporting of data in future accident and incident investigations and reporting to allow future\nimprovements to these models.