A plane is on fire after skidding off the runway at Toronto's International Airport (YYZ). It is believed to be a Boeing 737, but this article also states that it may be an Air France plane, which doesn't fly Boeing 737s to Toronto.

Here's a link:
http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1123014388624_118423588/?hub=TopStories

There is supposed to be a news conference at 5pm eastern.

I think its was a A340

Passenger jet on fire at Toronto airport
Last Updated Tue, 02 Aug 2005 16:53:30 EDT
CBC News
An Air France jet with as many as 200 people aboard has skidded off a runway while landing at Toronto's Pearson International Airport, bursting into flames and sending thick black smoke pouring into the air.

There is no word on the condition of the passengers and crew members on board the A340, with the plane still burning an hour after the 3:50 p.m. crash.


The Air France jet burst into flames after skidding off a runway at Toronto's Pearson Airport Tuesday.
The jet has a capacity of about 200 people.

The airplane was trying to land in bad weather when it skidded off the runway just metres from one of Toronto's busiest roads, Highway 401.

"There was quite a downpour. The visibility was really bad, with lots of lightning," said John Finday, a CBC News journalist who was at the airport at the time of the accident.

The jet crashed through barriers and ended up in a small ravine at the far west end of the airport, the fuselage tipped down and the aircraft's tail in the air.

"An Air France plane landing on runway 2-4 left went off the end of the runway in the area of Convert Drive and the 401 area in Mississauga," Peel police Sgt. Glyn Griffiths said at about 4:30 p.m. "Unknown at the time of any injuries. Flame was seen from the plane. And full response by all emergency vehicles."

The incident happened as most operations at the airport were grounded because of the severe thunderstorms that had been reported in the area.

Rescue crews are on the scene.

Wow... this could [tragically] be the first A340 to kill passengers. It's had a flawless safety record to date.

Let's hope it stays that way too. :cheers:

this is sad

Wow... this could [tragically] be the first A340 to kill passengers. It's had a flawless safety record to date.

Let's hope it stays that way too. :cheers:

Cheese Mmmmm, I'm not going to say that it sounds like you're hoping for casualties because it will ruin the Airbus A340's safety record, but your post comes pretty close to sounding that way.

watching the BBC live feed...this is sad:( :(

The Smoke Can Be seen from Toronto's far Suburbs
http://www.uploadhut.com/upload/239074.jpg??
http://www.uploadhut.com/upload/239076.jpg??

Cheese Mmmmm, I'm not going to say that it sounds like you're hoping for casualties because it will ruin the Airbus A340's safety record, but your post comes pretty close to sounding that way.

Yeah sorry... hopefully you realize I'm not that evil. :(

^I know you from your posts, but others might get the wrong idea.^

http://www.cbc.ca/gfx/pix/pearson_smoke050802.jpg

Looks like one of the pilots is in the hospital.

Thank god it didn't skid onto the 401, then there would be major casulaties. Hopefully everyone is safe.

Agh...hate to hear about accidents involving passenger aircrafts! Just read about. Hopefully it wasn't too too serious, but it looks bad with all that smoke.

Just heard some passengers witnessing on Canadian TV. Seems like there are 2 buses full of passengers taking them to the hospital.

CNN just said that all passengers made it out alive... hope it's true!

It does appear that everyone survived, but there were injuries that required some passengers to be taken to local hospitals.

Thats remarkable, kudos to the flight crew for a speedy escape.

Indeed. Seems as if there was a period of time for escape.

Just read about it on Swedish Text-TV. I hope no-one got seriously hurt och even worse. I visited that airport just a month ago.

All passengers survive Airbus Canada crash


By Janet Guttsman
21 minutes ago


TORONTO (Reuters) - An Air France Airbus burst into flames after overshooting the runway while landing at Toronto's Pearson International Airport in a storm on Tuesday, but all 309 passengers and crew survived.

Steve Shaw of the Greater Toronto Airport Authority said there were "no known fatalities" among the 297 passengers and 12 crew aboard the packed plane. All aboard were evacuated before the fire took hold, he said.

Witnesses said the plane may have been hit by lightning as it came into land and crashed into a gully. Officials said the airport had been under a "red alert" because of the danger of lightning.

Survivors said they "ran like crazy" from the wreckage.

"We were running really fast to get out of there," Olivier Dubos said on CNN.

Canadian television quoted police as saying that the pilot and a number of passengers been taken to hospital. A Canadian reporter said two busloads of passengers were taken into downtown Toronto from the crash site. CBC Radio said 14 people had been treated for minor injuries

An Air France ticket agent said the plane was its AF358 flight from Paris to Toronto, an Airbus A340 .

"An Air France plane landing on runway 2-4 went off the end of the runway in the area of Convair Drive and the 401 area in Mississauga," Peel police Sgt. Glyn Griffiths said.

Witnesses told Canadian television stations that the plane, had apparently skidded off the runway after landing amid lightning and rain.

Debbi Wilkes, who was driving in a car on a highway alongside the airport, said it was "pouring rain" and "pelting with hail" at the time.

"We saw a bolt of lightning come down and hit something," she said.

Huge clouds of black smoke and orange flames billowed from the fuselage. Firefighters sprayed foam over the wreckage to damp down the flames.

The plane was lying off the end of a runway close to a main traffic artery. Some passengers were said by local television to have made their way to the highway from where they were taken to hospital.

Afternoon rush hour traffic quickly clogged up along the highway, Canada's busiest, as vehicles passed only a few yards from the crash site.

Witness Corey Marx, who was standing by the highway watching planes land at the airport, told CNN: "It was about 4 o'clock. It was getting really dark. All of a sudden lightning was happening. A lot of rain was coming down. I didn't see the size of the plane but it was an Air France plane."

"It came in on the runway, everything looked good. Sounded good. Hit the runway nice and all of a sudden we heard its engines backing up."

Marx said rescue workers got to the plane within about 40 or 50 seconds.

Air France's Web site showed that flight 358 left Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris and was due to arrive at Pearson's terminal 3 on Tuesday afternoon.

Toronto airport has been closed to other traffic, with planes diverted to Ottawa and other nearby airports.

The location of the crash. Rumours swirl that the plane was struck by lightning.

http://www.tfsphoto.com/cyyz2.jpg

http://www.thestar.com/images/thestar/img/050802_pearson_crash_250.jpg http://www.thestar.com/images/thestar/img/050802_pearson_map.jpg

Shocked passengers and crew flagged down startled motorists on Highway 401 after an Air France jet carrying 297 passengers and 12 crew crashed and skidded into a ravine at Toronto's Pearson International Airport while attempting to land during a thunderstorm this afternoon.

Everyone survived; only a few passengers reported minor injuries.

As passengers scrambled across a fence and up an embankment to traffic rushing by on the nearby 401, Canada's busiest highway, explosions and bright flames ripped through the crumpled fuselage.

Passenger Roel Bramar, who recalled "running like crazy" after the crash, said the final approach seemed fast to him.

"I thought we were coming in a little too fast," he told CBC-TV. "The landing appeared to be okay until, it seemed, the captain wasn't able to apply sufficient braking power.

"Then, all of a sudden, everything went up in the air," he recalled. While passengers remained belted into their seats, "there was a real roller coaster going on. We had a hell of a roller coaster going down the ravine."

After the plane came "to an abrupt stop - and that's putting it mildly," Bramar said - cabin attendants opened the doors and passengers scrambled to emergency chutes as smoke began to billow up behind them.

Witnesses said the plane appeared to be making a normal descent until the very last moments, when it careened off Runway 24-Left and skidded into a ravine, where it burst into flames as passengers and crew raced to get off the plane using emergency chutes.

Air France confirmed there were no fatalities; emergency workers at the scene estimated about 14 injuries. Many of the injuries were minor enough to be treated on scene, officials said; most passengers were able to continue their journeys after making it to safety.

Passengers interviewed after the crash said cabin attendants quickly opened exit doors and deployed emergency chutes after the aircraft juddered to a halt in the ravine, just metres from Highway 401, which was already packed with homeward-bound commuters.

The airport was on Red Alert at the time, indicating special measures were being taken because of severe weather issues, including lightning and wind shear. Some eyewitnesses said they saw lightning strike the plane, and some passengers said after the crash that the cabin lights briefly went out just seconds before the crash.

Another witness said he heard the jet's engines power up as the pilot engaged the craft's thrust deflectors to bring his airplane to a stop.

Among the survivors seeking help was the co-pilot of the stricken craft.

"We located the co-pilot on Highway 401," said Peel police sergeant Glyn Griffiths.

"A pilot has gone to hospital, and they were picked up on the 401 and a number of other passengers were wandering around the area," Griffiths said.

Toronto ambulance spokesperson Larry Roberts said the passengers just made it off before the aircraft burst into flames about 200 metres to the west of Runway 24L, abutting the busy Highway 401.

"It looks like the passengers got off the plane before it got fully engulfed in flames," Roberts said.

The Airbus A340, which can be configured to carry up to 350 people, crashed at 4:03 p.m., Pearson airport officials said, confirming the passengers were able to exit the plane before it burst into flames.

Survivors emerging from the wreckage said the jet, Air France Flight 358 from Paris to Toronto, was full.

Roberts said Toronto's emergency services were quickly able to assemble several buses to transport ambulatory patients - the "walking wounded," he called them - to area hospitals.

At 5 p.m. half a dozen people milled about in the area near the crash, waiting for ambulances.

Roberts said injuries in such an accident could range from burns to broken bones, bruises and sprained ankles from sliding down the emergency chutes.

Eyewitness David Dennis, 13, at the airport's Sheraton hotel awaiting his mother's arrival on a flight from Chicago, stared out the window and saw "a massive wall of smoke" rising from the crash site a little over a kilometre away.

"The smoke wasn't that high, but it was very wide," said Dennis.

The crash led to an immediate but brief shutdown of Pearson.

Dennis' father David, in an arrival lounge at Terminal 3, said a Toronto airport official told people awaiting passengers that no further planes were arriving or leaving.

Nevertheless, he said, "the screens are still posting flight and arrival times, as if nothing had happened."

Hours after the crash, airport crash tenders continued to pour foam on the burning wreckage, resting in a green field at the southwest end of the airport as the airliner's blue, red and white Air France tail jutted proudly from the billowing smoke.


Aug. 2, 2005. 06:54 PM
NICOLAAS VAN RIJN
WITH STAR STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS

Air France jet crashes at Pearson, no fatalities
Last updated Aug 2 2005 07:07 PM EDT
CBC News

All 309 people aboard a jet that overshot a runway and burst into flames at Pearson International Airport Tuesday survived the ordeal, according to fire officials on the scene.

Steve Shaw, Vice President of Corporate Affairs for the Greater Toronto Airport Authority confirmed about "14 minor injuries" among the 297 passengers and 12 crew.

The Airbus A340 burst into flames that initially spread from the centre of the plane toward the rear. Eventually the entire fuselage was consumed.

Passengers from the flight reported that the plane severely rocked side-to-side after it touched down at 4:03 p.m.

The plane skidded off Runway 24 Left, an east-west runway laid out parallel to one of Toronto's busiest roads, Highway 401. It ended up about 200 metres past the end of the runway in the Etobicoke Creek ravine, a small valley at the far west end of the airport, the aircraft's fuselage tipped down and its tail in the air.

One passenger who was seated in the rear of the plane, Roel Bramar, told CBC News that he saw lightning just as the plane landed in a torrential downpour.

"I'm sure that the bad weather was responsible," said Bramar, who was not injured and managed to scramble off the plane by means of an emergency chute. He was the second person off the plane, he said.

"We had a hell of a roller-coaster going down the ravine," Bramar said. "All I could think of was 'Get off!'"

"An Air France plane landing on runway 24 went off the end of the runway in the area of Convair Drive and the 401 area in Mississauga," Peel police Sgt. Glyn Griffiths said at about 4:30 p.m.

The incident happened as most operations at the airport were halted because of severe thunderstorms in the area.

"There was quite a downpour. The visibility was really bad, with lots of lightning," said John Finlay, a CBC journalist who was at the airport at the time of the accident.

At mid-afternoon Tuesday, a spokesperson with the Greater Toronto Airports Authority said lightning was causing technical problems with the airport's lightning-detection system. All aircraft had been grounded for safety reasons as a result, largely to protect gound crews.

http://www.cbc.ca/gfx/pix/pearson_smoke050802.jpg http://www.cbc.ca/gfx/pix/pearson_extinguish050802.jpg

No known fatalities’ in Toronto jet crash
Air France Airbus A340 skids off runway in bad weather; 24 passengers hurt
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Photos/050802/050802_crash_hmed_4p.hlarge.jpg

A television image from Sky News shows the crash site where an Air France passenger jet skidded off the runway Tuesday and burst into flames after landing in a thunderstorm at Toronto's Pearson International Airport.

MSNBC staff and news service reports
Updated: 8:02 p.m. ET Aug. 2, 2005

TORONTO - A jetliner carrying more than 300 erupted in flames Tuesday after skidding off a runway while landing in a thunderstorm at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport. A government official said it appeared everyone survived, but airport authorities said 24 people suffered minor injuries.

Police said the plane was an Air France A340 from Paris that was trying to land at Canada’s busiest airport when it ran into trouble. There was a storm — with lightning and strong wind gusts — in the area at the time.

Steve Shaw, a vice president of the Greater Toronto Airport Authority, said at a news conference shortly after the accident that 14 passengers were injured but that there were “no known fatalities.” The injury count was later increased to 24, with some passengers reportedly suffering from smoke inhalation.

haw said there were 297 passengers and 12 crew aboard Air France Flight 358.

Police spokeswoman Diane Cossitt said she heard over police scanners that the passengers and crew were evacuated. “That is my understanding from what I’ve heard, but I’ve got no confirmation one way or the other,” she said.

Toronto Fire Services Capt. David Sheen told CNN that he understood some casualties had been taken to hospitals but had no information on their condition.

Survivors rescued
AM 680, an all-news station, reported live from the scene that there were two explosions on the plane. The station quoted a police official on the nearby freeway as saying two groups of passengers had been evacuated from the jet.

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/Components/Interactives/News/Transportation/Toronto_airport_crash.gif
Toronto’s William Osler hospital was placed on “code orange” to prepare for injuries, according to MSNBC.

A row of emergency vehicles lined up behind the wreck, and a fire truck sprayed the flames with water. A government transportation highway camera recorded the burning plane, and the footage was broadcast live on television in Canada and the United States.

A portion of the plane’s wing could be seen jutting from the trees as smoke and flames poured from the middle of its broken fuselage. At one point, another huge plume of smoke emerged from the wreckage, but it wasn’t clear whether it was from an explosion.

Shaw said at the news conference that the plane appeared to have overshot the runway by 200 meters, or about 655 feet.

Next to Canada’s busiest highway
The flaming ruin was next to Highway 401, Canada's busiest, and some cars and trucks stopped on the roadway after the crash. The Toronto airport has been closed to other traffic, with planes diverted to Ottawa and other nearby airports.

Corey Marks said he was at the side of the highway when he watched the Air France plane touch down and crash.
http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/msnbc/Components/Interactives/News/Transportation/Airbus_300_340_specs2.gif
“It was around 4 o’clock, it was getting really dark, and all of a sudden lightning was happening, a lot of rain was coming down,” Marks told CNN. “This plane ... came in on the runway, hits the runway nice. Everything looked good, sounds good and all of a sudden we heard the engines backing up. ... He went straight into the valley and cracked in half.”

Roel Bramar, a passenger on the flight, told the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. that lightning may have struck the plane.

“Just as we landed the lights turned off,” he said. “I’m sure that the bad weather was what was responsible.”

Flight originated in Paris
Flight 358 was scheduled to arrive in Toronto at about 4 p.m. from Charles de Gaulle International Airport near Paris.

“They made an approach in weather that was worse than what they anticipated,” John Wiley, a retired Airbus pilot in Toronto, told CNN.

Thunderstorms create the possibility of wind shear, the sudden, dangerous air currents that can dash an airplane to the ground as it takes off or lands.

Toronto’s Lester B. Pearson International Airport handles more than 28 million passengers a year. Located 17 miles west of Toronto in the town of Mississauga, it has three terminals. Air France operates out of Terminal 3.

Past crashes
The last major jet crash in North America was on Nov. 12, 2001, when American Airlines Flight 587 lost part of its tail and plummeted into a New York City neighborhood, killing 265 people. Safety investigators concluded that the crash was caused by the pilot moving the rudder too aggressively.

Paris-based Air France-KLM Group is the world’s largest airline in terms of revenue. It is the product of the French flagship airline’s acquisition last year of Dutch carrier KLM. For the year ended in March, the company earned $443 million on revenues of $24.1 billion.

Air France-KLM operates a fleet of 375 planes and flies 1,800 daily flights, according to the company’s Web site. In the last fiscal year, it carried 43.7 million passengers to 84 countries around the globe.

The Associated Press and Reuters contributed to this report.

First shots of burned out hull:

http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y162/sk8rboiiii/2.jpg
http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y162/sk8rboiiii/4.jpg

Nobody died!
Just 14 injured.
It was an A340, bought in September 1999.
;)

... and my wish came true, the A340 still has a ZERO FATALITY safety record!

:cheers: :cheers: :cheers:

Kudos to the AirFrance crew on that flight, they sure earned their paychecks yesterday.

:grouphug:

Air France establishes Toll Free Number for flight AF358
3 August 2005


Air France flight AF 358, inbound to Toronto from Paris, skidded off the runway and burst into flames while landing at Toronto Pearson Airport.

The aircraft, an Airbus A340, had 297 passengers and 12 crew members on board. Everyone on board the jet was able to get off the plane, and thankfully there were no victims and just 22 passengers suffered minor injuries.

It is the first major crash of an Airbus A340-300 since the model's first flight in October 1991.

Air France has established a passenger information centre, and a toll-free number is available for family and friends of those who may have been on board flight AF 358.

The toll-free number is :

For those calling from France : 0 800 800 812
For those calling from outside : + 33 1 56 93 10 00

Investigation begins into Air France fire
Wednesday 3rd August, 2005 (UPI)



A team from Canada's federal Transportation Safety Board is investigating Tuesday's crash landing of an Air France A340-300 at Toronto's airport.

Flight 358 from Paris skidded off a runway, broke in two and burst into flames after landing at Pearson International Airport in a raging downpour. All 309 passengers and crew survived.

About 43 people suffered injuries ranging from smoke inhalation to fractured bones, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported.

Between 10 and 15 TSB investigators will recover the aircraft's black box flight recorders and interview pilots, crewmembers and witnesses to determine how the plane ended up in a ravine at the end of the runway after touching down.

It's like a crime scene investigation, a TSB spokesman said.

The independent agency will look at crew fatigue, interaction between pilot and tower aircraft controllers and the weather at the time of the landing.

http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/41373000/jpg/_41373635_mobile_airfrance203.jpg
http://www.cbc.ca/news/photogalleries/pearson_crash/images/01.jpg
http://newsimg.bbc.co.uk/media/images/41372000/gif/_41372141_toronto_plane_crash2416.gif



NATIONALITIES OF FLIGHT 358 PASSENGERS
104 Canadians
101 French citizens
19 Italians
14 Americans
8 Indian citizens
7 Britons

Nobody died!
Just 14 injured.
It was an A340, bought in September 1999.
;)


43 had been reported injury yesterday night but all of them are minor condition :cheers:

Incredible pictures.

http://www.bjones4.dsl.pipex.com/AF358_3.jpg

http://www.bjones4.dsl.pipex.com/AF358_4.jpg

http://www.bjones4.dsl.pipex.com/AF358_2.jpg

http://www.bjones4.dsl.pipex.com/AF358_5.jpg

http://www.bjones4.dsl.pipex.com/AF358_6.jpg

Data recorders retrieved from Pearson's fiery plane crash
Last updated Aug 3 2005 04:49 PM EDT
CBC News

The flight data and cockpit voice recorders from the Air France plane that crashed and burned near Pearson airport were recovered Wednesday, as the federal Transportation Safety Board's probe got underway.

While officials say the recorders are in the hands of the safety board, they did not comment on the condition of the equipment or how useful the data is expected to be.

A team of more than two dozen investigators will be involved in piecing together every detail of how the Air France A-340-300 arriving from Paris managed to overshoot a runway at the airport on Tuesday afternoon. The role of the severe weather at the time of the incident is one of many factors to be considered investigators say.

* Related story: Co-pilot landed ill-fated Air France flight

None of the 309 passengers or crew was killed when the plane skidded into a wooded ravine and caught fire, a short distance from the busy Highway 401.

Forty-three people reported minor injuries, including broken bones, cuts, bruises and smoke inhalation. Many had been released from hospital by Wednesday morning.

The Air France plane landed in the midst of a violent thunderstorm, so weather is likely to play a major role in the investigation.

"At this point, it would be inappropriate to second-guess why the captain attempted the landing," Transportation Safety Board spokesman Conrad Bellehumeur told CBC News Wednesday morning, after board investigators had conducted their first interviews with some crew members and passengers.

After the crash, some passengers have said, at least one of the emergency chutes was not working properly, meaning people on the plane had to jump several metres to reach the ground. That's when many of the injuries occurred, they told reporters.

Bellehumeur said the board's first priority was to retrieve the aircraft's data recorders, the so-called black boxes.

Other investigators will focus on the human factor: gathering witness statements, interviewing the rest of the crew and passengers, and talking to the air traffic controllers.

They will examine issues such as crew fatigue, interaction between crew and cockpit, interaction between pilot and tower, direction given by air traffic controllers and the weather at the time of the crash.

The TSB investigation will include the active participation of France's Accident Analysis Bureau [BEA], according to a late night news release on Tuesday from the French Department of Transport.

"It's like a crime scene investigation," said Bellehumeur. "We're going to follow every lead, and as soon as we see something of importance that might have contributed to the crash, we'll make that known publicly. "Normally accidents of this kind are not caused by one single factor. It's normally a number of contributing factors that lead to the accident," he said.

The board, an independent agency, investigates the conditions and the circumstances surrounding air, rail, sea and pipeline accidents. It does not lay blame, but will offer a report with suggestions on how to prevent similar accidents in the future.

This photo made it to a Hong Kong newspaper cover today. I don't recall seeing it from other media coverage :

http://the-sun.orisun.com/tsnmain/20050804/img/0804main.jpg

Experts downplay ravine risk
Bridge was suggested after 1978 crash But this time, creek may have saved lives
Scott Roberts
Toronto Star
4 August 2005

The steep ravine that caused Air France Flight 358 to snap in half may have saved the lives of hundreds of passengers, experts said yesterday, downplaying a 25-year-old report recommending that a bridge be built over Etobicoke Creek as a safety strip for errant planes.

"If that ravine was covered up, this aircraft could very well have ended up on Highway 401," said Joseph D'Cruz, an airline expert at the U of T's Rotman School of Management. "The ravine contributed to destroying the aircraft, but nobody got hurt. And I think that's what we have to look at here."

The Airbus A340 slammed into the ravine Tuesday after skidding off Runway 24L, coming to rest just metres from Canada's busiest highway.

While D'Cruz defended the ravine, others are criticizing authorities for ignoring a recommendation more than 25 years ago that a causeway be built over the creek, to lengthen the overrun.

A coroner's jury recommended the move following the failed takeoff of Air Canada Flight 189 in June 1978. The DC-9 skidded off a parallel runway into the creek, killing two and injuring 105.

At the time, there was a 15-metre drop into the creek. Seven years later, ground workers lessened the slope.

But Transport Canada, which operated Pearson at the time, refused to build a bridge, calling the project "an enormous expense." At the inquest after the crash, officials estimated the cost of the project at $1.2 million.

The federal agency also said the ravine was unsuitable for constructing a foundation and defended Pearson's overrun lengths, which complied with national and international regulations.

The Greater Toronto Airports Authority, which took over operations in 1996, would not comment on why the bridge remained unbuilt, but said the runways meet all federal guidelines.

D'Cruz agrees, saying the 2,896-metre runway is "perfectly adequate for the largest commercial aircrafts in service. There's no reason to lengthen them. ... A normal landing for this type of aircraft would not have required more than 2,000 metres. And that's in the rain."

Some Air Canada pilots are also speaking out in defence of Pearson airport, calling the ravine a non-issue.

"In a perfect world, sure, I'd like to have an extra 500 or 1,000 feet of clear way after the runway ends," said pilot Tony Madsen, formerly based at Pearson. "But realistically speaking, I don't think the cost would ever justify building that."

Long, smooth overruns have become a luxury in commercial aviation, the Air Canada Pilots Association said.

"Unfortunately most airports were built a long time ago and they've expanded over many decades," said its president, Capt. Kent Wilson. "I guess in the flying business you accept that airports are built that way and there's hazards at the end of the runways. Some are good, some are bad and some are indifferent."

Overshooting runways at other airports can be much more risky, particularly ocean-side fields like New York's LaGuardia, Vancouver, Hong Kong and San Francisco, Madsen said. "If you overshoot those, you'll be in the water. That could end up being much worse."

Technology does exist to prevent overshooting. JFK International in New York has installed Engineered Materials Arresting Systems, a substance made of loose cellular cement that crushes under a plane's weight, halting it nearly instantly.

"I'm sure it's something that will come up in discussions," Steve Shaw, the Greater Toronto Airports Authority's vice-president of corporate affairs.

Many runways have ravines at one end or another, because the runways have to be basically flat and if you have terrain that isn't flat then you have to raise one end of the runway and you end up with a ravine.

I think that all of Atlanta's runways have a ravine on one end of each runway.

Toronto jet virtually impossible to stop - probe
By Rachelle Younglai

TORONTO, Aug 7 (Reuters) - The Air France jet that slid off the end of the runway in Toronto last week was virtually unstoppable, investigators said on Sunday, as they continued to examine flight recorder data for clues to the crash.

The Airbus A340 failed to stop after touching down during a severe thunderstorm at Canada's busiest airport last Tuesday, plunging into a ravine and burning to a charred and twisted hulk. All 309 people on board survived.

Data downloaded from the flight data recorder, or black box, showed that the plane landed about 4,000 feet (1,220 metres) from the end of the 9,000-foot (2,750-metre) runway.

"We are talking about nearly halfway down the runway," said Real Levasseur of Canada's Transportation Safety Board.

"I am pretty convinced that there was no way the aircraft could have stopped before the end, with the runway conditions that we had, the water on the runway and the braking action, which was poor."

Information from the flight data recorder also showed that the plane landed at a speed of about 148 knots. The normal speed is 140 knots.

"The pilot flying was fairly close to the airspeed that he should have been at," said Levasseur, who has not spoken directly to the Air France captain.

Levasseur, who leads a team of more than 50, has already said there was no evidence to suggest that lightning was a factor in the crash. There was also little evidence to suggest that hydroplaning, which would have cause the aircraft to skim along on a film of water without touching the runway, played a role.

An expert from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration was examining the more than 1,600 feet (490 metres) of tire marks left on the runway.

"Definitely because of the weather conditions, the deceleration would have been much slower than what it would have been for a dry runway with maximum braking," Levasseur said. "The brakes are much less efficient on a wet runway than a dry runway."

All passengers and crew were able to get out of the aircraft even though several escape doors were unusable.

Levasseur said fire on one side of the plane prevented flight attendants from opening two of the doors. Obstacles and sharp objects prompted a flight attendant to close another door after the emergency slide was deployed.

Another door partly opened as the aircraft fell into the ravine, and some passengers used that one, Levasseur said.

what? what was happened? an air-france a340 crashed?

i'm back from my holiday so i didn't heard it.

You are sooo late.... Nobody died anyways

ow, that's good news!

Toronto runway below international standards: pilots

WASHINGTON, Aug 5 (AFP) - The runway of the Toronto airport where an Air France flight crashed does not conform to international standards, an association of US and Canadian pilots said Friday.

Toronto's Pearson International Airport, the site of Tuesday's crash, lacks a "runway safety area" which offers a margin of safety if a landing jet cannot stop normally, the Airline Pilots Association, International said in a statement.

Descending in a severe storm, the Air France flight overran the runway and plowed into a ravine. All 297 passengers and 12 crew escaped the jet before it burst into flames.

A senior Canadian air accident investigator in Toronto said Friday that the jet appeared to land too far down the runway before going past the edge.

The airline pilots association, which represents some 64,000 pilots in North America, cited a number of crashes at airports with what it said were inadequate runway safety areas.

"A margin of safety must be maintained so that a slight overrun due to mechanical, weather or other operational problems does not become a catastrophe," the pilots said.

The association noted that two people died in 1978 at the same Toronto airport when an Air Canada DC-9 overran the runway and broke up.

"The report from the Canadian government concluded that the ravine 'contributed to a high casualty rate'," the association said.

The group also cited accidents at airports with substandard runway safety areas in Charlotte, North Carolina, New York City (La Guardia airport) and Little Rock, Arkansas.

"There are dozens of airports in the US and Canada, many of which service large metropolitan areas with large, international aircraft, that do not meet US or international standards," the pilots group said.

AF358 probe will study 2001 Airbus mishap: 'Looking at all incidents'
Tom Blackwell
National Post
13 August 2005

An Air France accident four years ago -- involving an Airbus 340, a rainstorm, wind shears and missed runway -- has raised new questions about the airline's similar, fiery crash-landing in Toronto this month.

The May, 2001, mishap, which resulted in no injuries, involved the same model of plane as overran a runway at Pearson airport and occurred in equivalent weather conditions.

A French workplace safety agency blamed the accident in French Guiana on the pilots' over-reliance on automated systems, and recommended that landing protocols be changed.

It is unclear whether Air France ever implemented the advice, however.

As it conducts its investigation of the Toronto incident, the Transportation Safety Board of Canada will undoubtedly look at the earlier event and the report on it, said John Cottreau, a spokesman for the board.

"They will be looking at all incidents of difficulty with this aircraft," he said yesterday.

But one outside expert questioned the French safety report's advice, and Air France spoke out against the release of information that it suggested could interfere with the board's investigation.

"The commission should be left to work without any outside intervention," said a release from the airline.

Landing in a thunderstorm on Aug. 2, Air France Flight 358 sped off the end of its runway at Pearson, careening into a ravine and bursting into flames. All 309 passengers and crew escaped.

The safety board has confirmed the plane landed about halfway along the 2.7-kilometre runway -- much farther than usual -- on wet pavement and had no chance of stopping in time.

Experts have speculated the plane likely encountered some kind of wind shear -- a sudden change in wind speed or direction -- that caused it to lift up off its glide path and land well past the comfort zone.

A U.S. expert who has seen Doppler radar imagery said it appears a microburst -- a sudden downdraft of air -- hit near the runway at about the time Flight 358 landed.

In the 2001 incident, an A340 was landing in Cayenne, French Guiana, during a tropical storm, when it suddenly lost altitude and bumped onto the ground 30 metres short of the runway. It sped over the barrier at the runway threshold, damaging the undercarriage.

A small fire started in the brakes, but there were no injuries.

The pilots had entrusted the plane's power levels to the auto thrust system, which is supposed to automatically set the speed according to the jet's weight and other variables.

When the plane encountered wind gusts first in one direction, then suddenly in the opposite direction, just before landing, the auto thrust system responded by maintaining the pre-planned speed, according to a report from the Comite d'hygiene, de securite et des conditions du travail (CHSCT).

The accident occurred because the auto thrust had reduced the speed too much in the final approach, making it unable to compensate for the wind conditions, said the CHSCT, which investigates workplace accidents.

"The co-pilot in charge of landing was in a state of over-confidence in this automation," said the agency's report. It quoted him as saying later he was not sure if he could fly without the auto thrust on.

The CHSCT said both it and the Airbus manufacturer believe the auto thrust system is not capable of maintaining adequate power levels in all bad weather situations.

The report recommended that such information be passed on to Air France crews. But the report noted that in a 2002 version of the A340 protocol, Air France still recommended that auto thrust be used to manage speed when wind shear is suspected.

Toronto runway below international standards: pilots

WASHINGTON, Aug 5 (AFP) -...The group also cited accidents at airports with substandard runway safety areas in Charlotte, North Carolina, New York City (La Guardia airport) and Little Rock, Arkansas....

Well they got a definite point with LaGuardia. Two seven thousand foot runways that have at least one end extended over the East River. That would easily qualify as lacking a runway safety area. But, my question is: what pilot in the world is not familiar with LaGuardia's peculiar situation?? Has any pilot commented on approach to LGA, "hey, these runways are short and end in the river." It really is ridiculous for the Airline Pilots Association to say this about LGA!!!

The GTAA never had problems spending money so im sure it will be fixed right away...unless the government is expected to pay for such things??

Look out Narita!! Pearson may overtake you on landing fees.