The 2009 picture of fatal accidents in worldwide commercial aviation showed no overall improvement from 2008, but in one important category, there was good news. Runway excursion accidents — targeted by the Flight Safety Foundation Runway Safety Initiative and the Runway Excursion Risk Reduction Toolkit — were fewer, according to newly released data from Boeing Commercial Airplanes.1
Twelve of the 62 total accidents, or 19 percent, were overruns or veer-offs, both classified as runway excursions.2 Of the 53 accidents in 2008, 16 — 30 percent — were runway excursions. In 2007, the Boeing data included 10 excursions, 26 percent of the 38 total accidents.
One of the 2009 excursion accidents involved fatalities, compared with three in 2008. Some of the latest excursions involved equipment failures rather than faulty takeoffs or approaches. One excursion resulted from the inabi…
