What Lessons Have Been Learned... And Have They Been Heeded?

One year ago today, just after 0600 local time at a small regional airport in Lexington, KY, a Comair CRJ-100 regional jet lined up on runway 26, and started rolling on what the flight crew no doubt thought would be an uneventful, thoroughly routine takeoff. It wasn't.

No one knows when the two pilots realized their grossed-out RJ wouldn't be able to lift off before the pavement ran out... which it did, about half as soon as they initially thought it would.

As ANN reported, the CRJ impacted terrain just off the departure end of 26. News-Spy reports almost immediately pinpointed the primary cause of the accident: the pilots had tried to take off on 26, a 3,500-foot runway used only by general aviation aircraft at LEX. 

The lone controller on duty in the Blue Grass Regional Airport tower that morning had cleared the jet to depart from runway 22 -- which, in addition to being twice as long as 26, is also twice as wide... and lighted.

Of the 47 passengers and three crewmembers onboard the CRJ, only one survived -- first officer James Polehinke, who was the flying pilot at the time of the accident.

In the month following the accident, the FAA issued a Safety Alert For Operators (SAFO) essentially reminding airline pilots to verify their planes are lined up on the correct runway before takeoff.

The agency also strongly urged pilots to review all Notices to Airmen pertaining to their departure airport, particularly to those concerning taxiway construction and alternate routing -- something the FAA, and later the National Transportation Safety Board, said may not have been done by the Comair crew, despite construction at the airport.

Investigators also determined the FAA was partly to blame for the accident, in staffing the control tower at LEX with one controller -- who was working his second shift of the day at the time of the crash, with scant rest in between. The FAA admitted the tower should have had two controllers on duty... another set of eyes, perhaps, that may have caught as Flight 5191 lined up on the wrong runway.

On Sunday, family members of those lost in the accident gathered a public ceremony in Lexington. While the event was meant primarily to memorialize the victims of the crash, those in attendance also question whether the government -- relatively quick to determine pilot error was to blame for the accident -- is doing all it can to implement safety procedures enacted in the 365 days since.

"Where does it go?" Kevin Fahey, who lost his son Thomas in the accident, asked the Cincinnati Post. "The action plan to address these recommendations seems to remain a plan too long and not become a concrete procedure or stipulation."

The FAA says it doing at it can, as fast as it can. In January, the agency stipulated graphics of closed taxiways be included in airport notices to pilots, in addition to text versions. By October, standardized reports -- direct from the government, regardless of what dispatch operator the airline uses -- will be in cockpits, to give all crews the same information.

"We're in the safest period in aviation history, but we don't want to rest on those successes," said FAA spokeswoman Laura Brown. "We keep trying to make improvements that will make aviation even safer."

Private contractors have also stepped up to the plate. Just over one week after the Comair accident, Honeywell Aerospace noted its Runway Awareness & Advisory System (RAAS, shown at right) might have prevented the accident from occurring. In a clear voice, RAAS tells flight crews where they are on the airport -- reducing the chance of a runway incursion, or a trip down the wrong path.

The system has since been certified by the FAA, and six airlines have equipped some 808 planes with the system, according to the Post. "Would it have broken the chain?" Honeywell spokesman Bill Reavis said. "There's no way to speculate."

(Editor's Note -- It's worth noting similar technology is available to general aviation pilots, as well, in the form of Hilton Software's SmartTaxi system... available on the WingX 2.0 browser for the Pocket PC.)

Another company, Aviation Communications Surveillance Systems, developed a moving-map program in 2005 showing pilots where their plane is on an airport. UPS is using it... but other airlines may need to be 'coaxed' by the government, said company spokesman Steve Henden.

"It's going to take the government stepping up and saying we're not going to stand for any more accidents related to runway incursion," Henden said. "Until they're told to do it, they're not likely to do it."

Despite the progress made, however, some victims' families say more should be done -- including a more concerted effort to eliminate "chatter" from the cockpit in the crucial time before takeoff. Cockpit voice recordings taken from 5191 show both pilots spoke of such mundanities as work hours and their pets in the moments leading up to the accident.

"Accidents will happen because sloppiness in the cockpit has become a habit," said Wayne Turner, who lost his brother in the crash. "Lives are too precious to afford that kind of latitude."

Turner suggests random CVR checks, to make sure pilots maintain a sterile cockpit at crucial times.

FMI: www.ntsb.gov, www.comair.com