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American Airways is not a 3rd world carrier. Why the 737 runway overrun in Jamaica?

Runway Overrun May Have Prevented Flight 331 Accident By Mike Mitchell January 1, 2010, - An American Airlines Flight 331 departed Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on Tuesday, December 22, 2009, with a stop at Miami International Airport. Flight 331 then departed Miami for Kingston's Norman Manley International Airport. Flight 331 touched down at Kingston Jamaica approximately 10:00 pm local time, the aircraft overshot the end of the runway while landing in heavy rain, crossed a road and stopped on a beach. Multiple injuries had been reported. Kingston Airport does not have a have an added buffer at the end of runways to prevent these kinds of accidents from happening. In the United States most airports have what is called an “Runway Overrun” or safety area which servers as an additional buffer of land for aircraft that overshoot the end of the runway. However, there are numerous airports in the U.S. that do not have this added buffer at the end of their runways. Logan Airport will build a deck into Boston Harbor that will allow them to add an additional 600 feet to runway 33 L which was the site of a runway overrun accident in 1982 that resulted in two deaths. The National Transportation Safety Board dispatched a team of investigators to assist the government of Jamaica in its investigation of an accident involving an American Airlines B737-800 (N977AN). John Lovell was designated senior air safety investigator for the NTSB. A U.S. team was dispatched to assist the government of Jamaica Civil Aviation Authority. The team included five NTSB aviation specialists as well as technical advisors from the Federal Aviation Administration, American Airlines, Boeing Aircraft Company, and GE Aircraft Engines. Two U.S. attorneys have made it know that they are working with passengers of Flight 331 to assist in legal actions. It appears their claims will be based on a claim that the Boeing's 737-800 aircrafts have had repeated problems with their thrust reversers, spoilers and brakes and that the 737-800 has been involved in several accidents since 2006. The 737-800 is a stretched version of the 737-700, and replaces the 737-400. It also filled the gap left by Boeing's discontinuation of the McDonnell Douglas MD-80 and MD-90 after Boeing's merger with McDonnell Douglas. The -800 was launched by Hapag-Lloyd Flug (now TUIfly) in 1994 and entered service in 1998. The 737-800 seats 162 passengers in a two class layout, or 189 in one class, and competes with the A320. For many airlines in the U.S., the 737-800 replaced aging Boeing 727-200 trijets.

Public Comments

1. Planes/compaines/government/airport make exceptions to flights that are low on fuel, being departed to a different airport. American Airlines does fly to Jamaica but b/c of heavy rain, etc, etc, in Miami the pilot probably realized that a go-around in Jamaica would not be wise as the fuel necessary wasnt there and the weather conditions probably werent going to change in the time the fuel would keep the plane flying. WTF is your qestion? Why AA goes to Jamaica? Cause they had to.
2. the last time I was in La Guardia airport in NYC, the overrun was a tiger stripped concrete wall. So what is the question, should I fly into Kingston? OR should I fly AA? OR should I fly in a 737-800? OR should I just go take a flying leap? I suspect your question is really the last one and the answer is YES! I've flown on the 37-800 many times and the only problem was the entertainment suite packed it in on my last flight. You can't expect to have the same flight ops in another country that you have at home. Look at the Air France plane that over shot in bad WX in Toronto, crashed into a ravine and burned. Thank God everyone got out OK with minor cuts and bruises. Toronto is Canada's busiest airport with a good safety record.
3. Maybe Jamaica does not require airports to have that added buffer in case an airplane overshoots the runway. As for Boeing aircraft, they are extremely safe and I have flown in the 737-800 many times without incident. When an airplane crashes, there can be several factors such as pilot error, weather, aircraft malfunction or combination of these things. What happened to AA flight 331 was sad but it is fortunate that pretty much everyone survived.