The incident led to the airport shutting down regular operations for nine hours.
Yesterday afternoon, a Learjet 75 landed at the Aeroporto de Congonhas in São Paulo, and the tires on the left landing gear blew, causing the aircraft to suffer a runway excursion. Not only did the aircraft go off the runway, but continued over the taxiway and almost off a hill on the edge of the airport property.
Learjet runs off runway
The Learjet 75 was flying from Foz Do Iguaçu in Paraná to São Paulo, carrying three passengers and two pilots, when upon landing at 13:32 local time, tires blew, and the pilots lost control of the aircraft. No injuries were reported. The aircraft, tail number PP-MIX, belongs to a concrete company: Supermix Concreto.
Local YouTube channel Golf Oscar Romeo, which live streams operations 24/7 at CGH, caught the incident on video. The Learjet can be seen near the bottom of the screen towards the beginning of the video, followed by a trail of smoke.
In another video shared by Golf Oscar Romeo on YouTube, a comparison is shown between the speed of most passenger aircraft landing at CGH and the speed of the Learjet.
he incident led to the closing of the airport for hours, with inbound traffic having to divert to the nearby Aeroporto Internacional de São Paulo – Guarulhos (GRU) and the Aeroporto Internacional de Viracopos (VCP). Some flights were even diverted to airports in other states, including Belo Horizonte in Minas Gerais and the Galeão airport in Rio de Janeiro. Other flights were canceled, as there was no estimate as to when the airport would reopen.
The Aeroporto Internacional de Brasilia (BSB) shared on its social media accounts that the main runway at CGH was out of service and that some flights were delayed and others had already been canceled.
In total, 140 flights were canceled because of the incident. The aircraft was not taken off the runway for nine hours after almost falling off the hill on the side of the airport, and the runway was cleared to resume operations at 22:18 local time. Supposedly, there was no equipment readily available for the removal of the aircraft, leading to the nine-hour impact on operations.
TAM Flight 3054
Thirty years ago, Brazil’s deadliest air crash took place at the Congonhas Airport. A TAM Airlines Airbus A320-200 took off from Porto Alegre (POA) and crashed upon landing at CGH, killing all 187 passengers and crew.
The runway had been reported as wet and slippery earlier in the day, and this was still the case when flight 3054 landed. The pilots landed the aircraft with a deactivated reverse thruster, which required an additional 190 feet of runway in wet or slippery conditions. Failing to add the 180 feet into their calculations, the pilots also failed to deploy the ground spoilers, and the number two engine was providing thrust at the time of landing.
The Congonhas airport is situated in the middle of São Paulo, with a large street essentially running under one of the ends of the runway, meaning there was a large drop. The video below shows an Azul Linhas Aéreas Embraer E195 landing at CGH.
The aircraft ran off the runway and crashed into the TAM Express building located across the street, killing everyone onboard. Today, a memorial has been set up in remembrance of the accident that took place in 2007.
