2022-05 · NASA ASRS report 1903643
Air carrier flight crew reported a runway incursion at DFW when they misunderstood a taxi clearance. Aircraft on short final executed a go-around.
After landing at DFW on Runway 35R; we were cleared to taxi via EL; hold short of [Runway] 35C. It's a fairly long distance to get to 35C after landing 35R. As we were approaching 35C several Tower calls to landing traffic were to 'hold short of EK; expect crossing traffic.' This primed me to believe that we would be the crossing traffic. We were still rolling toward 35C holding point when an aircraft was cleared to cross 35C; I believe at Zulu. Then I believe [another air carrier aircraft] was cleared to cross and contact XXX.XX and I mistook that clearance to be for us. We had never come to a complete stop so when the copilot read back; Tower said 'negative' and I immediately braked but with the momentum we had; we crossed the hold short line. (The nose was well short of the runway edge.) [An air carrier] was issued a go-around. As we had approached 35C; I saw the arriving aircraft. I mistakenly thought it was a mainline (large) aircraft instead of a smaller regional aircraft. Because it looked so small I believed it was pretty far out from landing. [The landing aircraft] may have been between 200-100 ft. AGL when they executed their go-around. With the clearance of another aircraft to cross just moments earlier; my bias that the landing aircraft was much further out seemed confirmed. Hearing the Tower give land; hold short clearances; I was primed to be able to cross with aircraft on short final.
We landed on Runway 35R; exited the runway on Q4 and turned left on EL to hold short of 35C. After we turned onto EL I went heads down; called ramp control to get an entry point; and started the after landing flow. I heard Tower give a clearance to someone with a similar sounding call sign but I didn't pay much attention to it because I didn't think it was ours and I was doing my flow. Immediately after that the Captain exclaimed 'That was us!' or something to that effect with vigor and authority. I was startled by this; and read back to Tower 'clear to cross Runway 35C.' Tower replied with something to the effect of 'Negative; hold short of 35C;' however I don't remember the exact wording. The Captain slammed on the brakes but it was too late; our nose was already over the line. I told Tower 'We're already over the line;' and then I heard someone was going around. Tower then cleared us to cross the runway on EL and then cross 35L. After clearing 35L we were not given any more instructions by Tower so I called ground and obtained a clearance to the gate. In my opinion the Captain had get-home-itis. This was his last leg; he was taxiing very fast; and we turned off 35R on the high speed at 60 kts. which moved me in my seat. He slowed down slightly but we were still taxiing way faster than normal; every turn shifted my body in the seat due to centrifugal force. We were still going too fast in my opinion and I was going to say something but I didn't have the time to. There was little time in between the radio calls and the other duties that needed to be done I couldn't get a word in. I was also very tired; I only got 6 hours of sleep because of the obscenely early van and departure time. Taxi at normal speeds; don't be in such a rush to get home.
Source: NASA Aviation Safety Reporting System (public domain). Reports are voluntary submissions and are not verified by NASA.
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