Tailwind Takeoffs Are No Fun.

[Conrad]

Aspen airport reopens late Monday night after private jet goes off runway

A departing business jet went off the end of the Aspen airport runway around noon Monday, closing the airport on a busy travel day, the facility’s director said. All of the Monday flights in and out of Aspen were canceled, but normal operations will resume Tuesday.

www.aspentimes.com

Aspen airport temporarily closed after private aircraft ‘goes off the runway,’ no reports of injuries

Shortly before noon Monday, the Aspen-Pitkin County Airport was forced to close after a private jet “went off the runway.”

www.aspendailynews.com

Departing runway 33 when the wind is 16016G25KT


KASE 211853Z 16016G25KT 10SM FEW036 BKN060 01/M09 A2961 RMK AO2 PK WND 17027/1841 SLP988 T00111094

 

[MikeD]

Wonder what their performance showed for that tailwind component? 33 is used for most departures there, as 15 departures have terrain clearance issues. Used to be that prior permission was required to be had before being able to depart on 15; may still be the case.

ASE crash-fire-rescue is one of the busiest units out there, with real world incidents seemingly a somewhat regular occurrence.

 

[///AMG]

But wait, I thought a tailwind was a good thing? It blows you into the air faster right? Like a treadmill but natural

 

[DropTank]

Tailwind takeoffs are like pain killers
They are fine unless you mix them with something else.
Like short runways, terrain, limited power, heavy loading, lack of proficiency.

 

[Boris Badenov]

"Aspen airport PERMANENTLY CLOSED TO AIR CARRIER OPERATIONS after private aircraft 'goes off the runway'..."

FIFY. Rifle is an hour drive, gives you time to fluff your doo, check your email, get a blood transfusion from a tased teenaged athlete, or whatever other things you weirdoes get up to. All from the comfort of your Suburban.

 

[ahw01]

But wait, I thought a tailwind was a good thing? It blows you into the air faster right? Like a treadmill but natural

havent you got that 180 degrees out

 

[Wardogg]

"Aspen airport PERMANENTLY CLOSED TO AIR CARRIER OPERATIONS after private aircraft 'goes off the runway'..."

FIFY. Rifle is an hour drive, gives you time to fluff your doo, check your email, get a blood transfusion from a tased teenaged athlete, or whatever other things you weirdoes get up to. All from the comfort of your Suburban.

Never going to happen. Convenience is everything to them. I wonder how much pressure was put on them to take off.

I've got a good gig. Made a no-go weather call yesterday. No one batted an eye and I was thanked for it.

 

[Baronman]

I've never flown into Aspen but......sounds like it's controlled. The tower doesn't see the winds and say we're turning the airport around? Yes I know..."yer the PIC!" Still...between the PIC and tower you'd think someone would say something. Unless the wind shift was fairly recent...

 

[Wardogg]

I've never flown into Aspen but......sounds like it's controlled. The tower doesn't see the winds and say we're turning the airport around? Yes I know..."yer the PIC!" Still...between the PIC and tower you'd think someone would say something. Unless the wind shift was fairly recent...

"Instantaneous winds" is a thing there. Usually one direction in and the opposite way out.

 

[TWP]

This airport is stupid and shouldn’t exist.

 

[bLizZuE]

Flying the CRJ in there was always a hoot. Our station people could never understand why skywest could take a full plane to Denver but we couldn’t take a full plane to LAX or DFW or ORD.

 

[Fixtur]

I've never flown into Aspen but......sounds like it's controlled. The tower doesn't see the winds and say we're turning the airport around? Yes I know..."yer the PIC!" Still...between the PIC and tower you'd think someone would say something. Unless the wind shift was fairly recent...

Also, for better or worse the tower controllers are savvy to the 10kt tailwind limitation on many jets, and will report instantaneous winds as slightly lower to help "move things along".

I've definitely gone out of there with a slight <10kts no gusts tailwind, but I can't imagine the pressure on a Hawker captain electing to go in gusting winds over 20.

And to add to it, Rwy 33 is 2% downhill!

 

[Cory Trevor]

From the couple of months that I flew into aspen I felt like the Aspen controllers were amazing given the difficult and busy environment they work in.

 

[pwttogfk]

From the couple of months that I flew into aspen I felt like the Aspen controllers were amazing given the difficult and busy environment they work in.

They’re amazing at normalizing deviance. “Instantaneous winds” like the way they do it are asking for an accident. Yes, it takes two and most pilots play along. Just give the real winds. If it’s close and a wind check might help I’ll ask. When it’s a 20+ kt tailwind and you say “I’ll find you some good winds…” you’re helping line up the holes in the Swiss cheese.

 

[GypsyPilot]

I've never flown into Aspen but......sounds like it's controlled. The tower doesn't see the winds and say we're turning the airport around? Yes I know..."yer the PIC!" Still...between the PIC and tower you'd think someone would say something. Unless the wind shift was fairly recent...

Because it’s a very mountainous airport surrounded by high terrain. It isn’t Wichita. One way in (R15), one way out (R33) for most jets.

 

[woodreau]

Even better, on VMC days, tower points out traffic on 9 mile final to Rwy 15. You have to call traffic in sight, then the tower clears you for takeoff on Rwy 33.…. Then the tower tells the guy landing, departing traffic has you in sight, cleared to land 15.

oh that GPWS Terrain,terrain callout overflying triangle point on the LOC15? Noted.

 

[Gear_Swing1122]

I was in ASE yesterday when this happened, in fact we drove by the aircraft out in the snow on the way to the hotel. I don't know much, but when we landed earlier (winds were 170/11G16 or something like that) the airport was so packed we had to wait in the deice pad for 40ish minutes before rolling into Atlantic Aviation. While we waited the winds got pretty gusty, as mentioned above 160/16G25 or something. Tower was liberally using instantaneous wind reports. Both myself and my FO were fairly sure that the reality was most of the aircraft taking off were well outside the fairly standard 10kt tailwind limit on most jets. I think the instantaneous wind reports they do in ASE is more or less playing with fire. ASE is dangerous enough on a normal day.

 

[CK]

ASE should closed and turned into a high end mall. The relative lack of accidents in Aspen is more a testament to luck than the median skill of the pilots operating there. It’s only going to get worse as the airlines continue to suck talent/experience out of the 91/135 world.

Alex.

 

[dustoff17]

I think it was a Mexico-registered plane a few years ago that asked for winds four times on final. Each time the tower lowered the number until the pilot accepted, he slammed it on and then crashed (Killed one IIRC).

This having been stated, I love this airport! The challenge makes it “sporty”. I do NOT like flying in their in the Phenom 300 though….not having speed brakes is terrible!

 

[bike21]

All from the comfort of your Suburban.

Much to lowbrow for that crowd, they'd be all like "ewwww it's like I'm going to Breckenridge, as if."

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