Created Tuesday, Dec 29th 2020 19:52Z, last updated Monday, Dec 6th 2021 16:11Z
A Shanghai Airlines Boeing 737-800, registration B-1949 performing flight
FM-829 from Shanghai Pudong (China) to Pusan (South Korea) with 154 passengers and 8 crew, was on a circling approach to runway 18R in a right hand pattern cleared to land on runway 18R, but touched down on runway 18L. The aircraft rolled out without incident and taxied to the apron.
On Dec 29th 2020 South Korea's ARAIB released their final report in Korean (Editorial Note: (Editorial note: to serve the purpose of global prevention of the repeat of causes leading to an occurrence an additional timely release of all occurrence reports in the only world spanning aviation language English would be necessary, a Korean only release does not achieve this purpose as set by ICAO annex 13 and just forces many aviators to waste much more time and effort each in trying to understand the circumstances leading to the occurrence. Aviators operating internationally are required to read/speak English besides their local language, investigators need to be able to read/write/speak English to communicate with their counterparts all around the globe).
The report concludes the probable causes of the occurrence rated a "quasi accident" were:
The flight crew failed to identify runway 18R during approach and landing and landed on runway 18L instead. Contributing factors were:
- a narrow turn to final causing to complete the turn to runway 18R in time
- PAPIs of runway 18L were misidentified as glide path indication for runway 18R
- lack of communication between captain and first officer (CRM)
The aircraft carried three flight crew: the commander (36, ATPL, 10,322 flight hours total, 3,991 hours on type) was pilot monitoring occupying the left hand seat, an augmenting captain (no data provided) and the first officer (27, CPL, 3,331 hours total, 3,073 hours on type) was pilot flying.
The ARAIB reported the aircraft had performed a VOR/DME A approach to runways 18L/18R and had joined a right downwind for runway 18R, but flew a tighter downwind than usual. Abeam of the runway the runway was identified, the aircraft was handed to tower and cleared to land on runway 18R. About 1.5nm from the runway threshold runway 18R the aircraft began the base turn, crossed the extended center line of runway 18R in the base turn descending through about 700 feet AGL about 0.8nm from the threshold, lined up with runway 18L and touched down on runway 18L.
The ARAIB reported the captain reported in their base turn the aircraft encountered wake turbulence by a preceding aircraft, hence he focussed on controlling the attitude of the swaying aircraft. He was not aware that they had crossed the extended runway center line of runway 18R and were aligning with runway 18L. Tower instructed the aircraft to go around just one second prior to touchdown.
On Dec 6th 2021 South Korea's ARAIB released their English final report.
Flight path of B-1949 (green), usual pattern (yellow) (Graphics: ARAIB):
VOR/DME A Approach Chart valid at the occurrence time (Graphics: AIP South Korea):
Related Flight:
FM829,
Shanghai Airlines News
