What happened
On October 23, 2010, a Finnair Embraer 190 (registration OH-LKL) was performing a scheduled flight from Oslo Gardermoen to Helsinki-Vantaa. During the takeoff roll, the aircraft's nose gear and left main gear tires struck three runway edge lights. The impact caused minor damage to the tires and sent fragments of the light fixtures into the right engine, resulting in impact damage.
Despite the collision, the flight crew observed that the aircraft and engines continued to operate normally. The crew corrected the aircraft's path to the runway centerline and continued the takeoff. Once airborne, the pilots notified air traffic control of a suspected collision with the lights. A subsequent runway inspection confirmed that three edge lights had been damaged. The flight proceeded to its destination, where the damage to the main gear tire was identified. The damage to the nose gear tire and the engine was only discovered later when the aircraft was moved to a hangar for maintenance.
The investigation
The investigation examined the circumstances leading to the collision, including environmental conditions, cockpit procedures, and air traffic control communications. Investigators looked into the specific characteristics of the taxiways and runway lighting at Oslo Gardermoen, as well as the effectiveness of Crew Resource Management (CRM) and the clarity of radio communications.
Findings
The flight crew mistook the left runway edge lights for the runway centerline lights while taxiing to the takeoff position. This error caused the aircraft to begin its takeoff run directly over the elevated, post-type edge lights.
Several contributing factors were identified:
- Inadequate Crew Resource Management (CRM) within the cockpit.
- Low visibility due to darkness.
- Specific physical characteristics of the taxiways, runway, and runway shoulder areas.
- Air traffic control communications that were delivered at a rapid rate of speech (exceeding the ICAO standard of 100 words per minute) and used incomplete phraseology, which may have induced a sense of urgency in the crew.
- Ambiguities in the airline's operational manuals regarding runway and takeoff position identification.
- A lack of standardized procedures at the airport for reporting and documenting foreign object debris (FOD) found in the movement area.