What happened
Two serious incidents occurred at Seletar Airport during night operations in 2024. On 17 July, a Dassault Falcon 900EX, registration M-ILTA, departed for Muscat, Oman. During rotation, the crew heard a loud noise and later discovered the aircraft had struck a runway edge light. Upon arrival in Oman, the aircraft was found to have damage to its nose landing gear tyre and an auxiliary shield door.
On 6 October, a Bombardier Global 6000, registration T7-RIC, departed for Bangalore, India. This aircraft struck several runway and taxiway edge lights, leaving debris on the runway. Following the flight, the aircraft was found to have deep cuts to its right main landing gear tyres and a hydraulic fluid leak from the brake system.
The investigation
The investigation established that in both instances, the aircraft had failed to align with the runway centerline, instead performing their take-off rolls along the right edge of Runway 03. For the second incident, the debris from the damaged lights remained on the runway until two subsequent aircraft landed and reported the presence of foreign object debris (FOD).
Investigators examined the visual environment at the airport, noting that the absence of runway centerline lights at Seletar, combined with the specific layout of the taxiway intersection, created a misleading visual path for the pilots.