Image: KHOU
A corporate jet skidded off a wet runway and into a creek at Sugar Land Regional Airport in Texas Friday,Houston-area mediareported. Two pilots on board were uninjured, and the Embraer Phenom ended up tail-first in Oyster Creek.After touchdown, the pilot tried to make a U-turn to avoid going off the end of the runway, said Patricia Pollicoff, a spokeswoman for the city of Sugar Land, which owns the airport. The FAA and NTSB are investigating. Meanwhile, area pilots speculated in the KHOU 11 News report that the wet runway and a tailwind were factors in the overrun.
“The fact that he landed with the wind, you need much more braking distance because you’re coming in much hotter, much faster, so I’m sure that had something to do with it,”pilot Mark Lasch told KHOU.”Usually on a wet runway we like to multiply the distance by two to make sure we have enough runway to land,”Eric Newman, a local CFI, told the station. “If the book says it’s going to take 2500 feet to stop we’ll say we’re going to need 5,000 feet to stop on a wet runway.” A similarincidentoccurred in the region in September, whenthe station reportedthat an Embraer jet skidded off-runway at Lone Star Executive Airport in Conroe, Texas. After the incident at Sugar Land, investigators will look into the jets’ braking abilities, the station reported.
