US to probe jet brakes on wet runways

AN American Airlines plane that careened off a slick Jamaican runway last year has prompted US crash investigators to reassess how well some jetliner braking systems perform on various runway surfaces in rainy conditions.

American Flight 331 was en route from Miami to Kingston in stormy weather when it landed nearly halfway down the runway on Dec. 22.

The pilots used maximum braking power but the Boeing 737 still slid off the end of the strip, ending up with a collapsed landing gear and the fuselage cracked in two places.

The crash, according to people familiar with the details, has led the National Transportation Safety Board investigators to challenge longstanding airline practices and technical assumptions regarding braking capabilities on wet runways, The Wall Street Journal reports.

By those criteria, the advanced Boeing 737-800 should have been able to stop safely on the strip.

Investigators do not believe there was a significant pool of water on the runway, though the crew was battling a stiff tail wind as well as some malfunctioning runway and approach lights, these people said. The crash, which did not result in any fatalities, but left several of the 154 people aboard hospitalized.

Safety board investigators are inclined toward drafting recommendations to reassess, and in some cases tighten, current safety margins for landing on wet runways.

If regulators in the US and elsewhere embrace more stringent rules, the result could be greater operational constraints on airlines planning to land on relatively short or outmoded runways when they are wet.

Jamaican officials have maintained that the Kingston runway meets all international safety standards.