Pilot’s error ‘negligent’

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I read your web news story about the pilot of a commercial flight who tried to take off from a taxiway at Nice airport. Sadly, it is not “an extremely rare” event. Along with quite a list of


misdemeanours, it is all too common. Access to a runway from the taxiway is recognisable by first a metre square black-on-yellow board to the right of the taxiway at what is known as the


‘Holding Point’. On entering and lining up, the first thing the pilot sees is a series of white bars across the runway threshold and the two- digit runway heading painted in white on the


runway. The fact these clues were not noticed is a clear indication of negligence. It is a failure that is worryingly frequent. RICHARD CHANDLESS, SAÔNE-ET-LOIRE