Pilot Killed as Plane Skids Into Thai Control Tower

With skies safe, officials turn their attention to 'surface threats' on runways

(NEWSER) - "America's skies are the safest they have ever been," Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood told reporters this week, and the stats back him up: Deaths from accidents in US commercial aviation have plummeted over the last 15 years, with none registered at all in 2011. Aviation officials say they are now turning their attention toward somewhere potentially much deadlier than the skies for commercial aircraft: the ground, and specifically, the runway. More»

Anti-trafficking officials tracked Dubai-bound carrier to Thai hub

(NEWSER) - Thai officials today nabbed a Dubai-bound man who was hauling “a virtual zoo” of endangered creatures around the Bangkok airport. When they opened his bags, they found a yawning bunch of sedated newborns: two leopards, two panthers, two macaque monkeys, and an Asiatic black bear, the AP reports. Anti-trafficking authorities had been tracking the United Arab Emirates citizen, 36, ever since he’d purchased the animals on the black market. More»

(NEWSER) - Mating season came to a speedy end for some turtles who strayed onto a runway at New York's JFK airport yesterday, the New York Post reports. After a pilot told air control he had run over some turtles on his way to take-off, wildlife workers shut down the runway for 35 minutes and moved the remaining 78 diamondback turtles back to the wild. The resulting delays slowed air traffic to a crawl for 90 minutes. More»

150 haven't taken required steps

(NEWSER) - A third of US airports haven't completed a mandated study of their bird-strike risk, USA Today reports. "This problem has been ignored and shuffled to the side by the aviation community," said an airport wildlife-control expert. The 150 airports won't be named until the FAA has contacted each one. The study is the first step in the process of creating a plan to safeguard an airport's planes from wildlife. More»

Plane forced to land nose down on bed of foam after landing gear gets stuck

(AP) - A plane carrying 51 people made an emergency landing in western Romania today, and all the passengers escaped, after part of the Carpatair flight's landing gear became stuck, the AP reports. The aircraft circled for almost two hours, using up its fuel to avoid a potential fire, officials said, before it landed nose-down on a bed of foam laid out by firefighters. More»