C-17 Inadvertently Lands at KTPF, Adjacent MacDill AFB

Hey Mav, you got the number to that truck driving school? What was it, truck masters?

I was stationed at MacDill when the Delta 727 landed there by mistake in 1980. I'm still unsure how that crew mistook runway 04 at MacDill, which was 500 feet wide at that time for runway 36L or 36R at Tampa International. Passengers on the 727 were probably shocked to be surrounded by Air Force Security Police when they landed!

Well if I'd have screwed the pooch and landed my PA32 at McDill instead of Peter O by mistake I'd still be spread eagle on the runway.

It can happen. Several Continental Express pilots over the years have landed at Southland Field, mistaking it for Lake Charles Regional (LCH) at night, and I thought they were awfully careless. My attitude changed when,a few months ago, I almost landed at LaPorte Airport in Houston rather than Ellington Field, in daylight. ATC gave me vectors that took me off the usual approach path to EFD, and then told me to look for other traffic that was on the approach to Ellington. The distraction of watching for other traffic to follow, and then suddenly seeing a runway appear where I expected it to be, led me to call the airport in sight and to be cleared for a visual approach. Fortunately a vigilant controller at Ellington noticed that I appeared to be descending toward LaPorte, not Ellington. I thanked her profusely after landing for saving me from an embarrassing mistake. Her response was "Hey, airline pilots have made the same mistake."

What is puzzling though is that if MacDill traffic gets handed off to it's tower at about 10 miles, WHAT HAPPENED?

Nice short field take-off. Well within design.

As much as the stars were aligned, how could an experienced crew, approach control, and the tower be so unaligned?

I have an aerial photo of Tampa that depicts both Peter O. Knight and MacDill in the background and the surroundings of each airport are nowhere similar. In addition, according to Google Earth, there is a 5.6 mile distance between each of the runway thresholds.
http://www.pbase.com/donboyd/image/144892857

c-17 is an amazing jet

Runway appeared not to have any damage given the fact 4-22 is rated for 20,000lbs single wheel.....

As a retired airline pilot, I can believe it can happen especially in broad daylight. This almost never happens in IMC. This is because on a real approach, all the navaids are used. In good VFR conditions, chatting about last night's bar tab or where we are going tonite, you let your guard down. Most, if not all commercial airlines require that all navaids be used all the time. If the ILS for your real destination is set and being used, you won't land in the wrong place. Not to say that I never lined up on the wrong runway! Thank God we caught it in time. Ha!

Duplicate post. Original posted 5 days ago with 95 comments. See popular squawks last week

I bet there are some flat spots on the tires....and maybe some brown spots elswhere.

(Duplicate Squawk Submitted)

C-17 Accidentally Lands at Small 3500ft GA Airport (Video)

A C17 mistakes Peter O Knight(TPF) for MacDill AFB. Lands on Runway 22 with 3,580ft to stop.

-Ryan Lowrey

http://www2.tbo.com/news/news/2012/jul/20/5/huge-air-force-cargo-plane-lands-at-davis-islands--ar-437276/

relax relax relax....it was just a braking and seat puckering factor test..lol

We ended up heading over to KTPF after work on the way to dinner. It became quite the neighborhood scene as the plane was getting ready to take off. Very impressive to see a plane of that size easily lift off from a short field, albeit with new pilots :)

Here was my vantage point: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=805M1svwp_8

It looked like a lost and lonely beached whale.

I believe in the 1960's a PAN AM 727 landed at KOSU instead of Port Columbus. They have the same runways but are miles apart. If you are ever in the Ohio State University Flight Ops. office you can see a picture of the plane.

What a totally beat-up story. How could any military jet ever land by mistake - in broad daylight - on the wrong airport ? The runway at TPF is nearly the whole width of the island, so it'd be nearly impossible to mistake it for MacDill AFB. Journalists reporting aeronautical stuff should at least be a little bit aware of reality.

reminds me of back in the early '80s when a Piedmont 727 landed by mistake at DNL instead of AGS. that was also in daytime.

Had a United DC-8 lined up with McClellan field (10 miles east of Sac Metro) on a VISUAL approach - never wanting to embarrass a fellow airmen or get a pilot in trouble - it was a sign of the times - I advised,
"United 235 turn right for your left base entry to runway 16"
Boy, those landing lights made a quick turn toward the airport and they landed at the right place... never heard from the pilot nor did I expect to.. they bailed me out a number of times, too! old ATC guy..

Priceless LMFAO ....you got to be kidding me...How do you explain this one to your commanding officer LOL

Does anybody have a better video??

and the pilot said, "damn, that runway wuz short", the right seat, looked out both the port and starboard windows and added, "kinda wide though"...

Once upon a time a C-141 bound for KBED landed at KORH, it was daytime and CAVU.

Funny how the view changes at altitude huh ? I went up one time to photgraph my house. Had a heck of a time finding it. Finally used WT navigation. What is WT navigatiion ? One of those tall white wind towers with the props on them !

oops

Good chance to practice short field OPS LOL.

Controllers monitor and track aircraft on radar until either see th airport or are on the IFR approach to the airport. What happend here is a fluster cluck on ATC and pilot.

Story goes that a guy put a 52 with nukes aboard down at Bradley..Couldnt find Westover I guess... Happy ending tho, he is now the senior senator from *****.. GBG

Over the years, KTPF has had a French C130 land there (although they later tried to deny it), 2 F-4 Phantoms, an F106, and several other aircraft. Approaching from the East, both runways (KTPF and MacDill) are aligned, and both have a large body of water on the approach end of the runway. I've always thought the 8000' difference in the runways would be a tip off, but apparently not. I suspect that landing is a career ender for a couple of Air Force pilots, and some tower controllers, too.

Pilot errow, but controllers should alerted the pilot they were lined up to land on the wrong airport. I am a retired air traffic controller and it happens.

Not sure how you make a visual error like this. 500 ft is minimums in a C 17, I think. When the pic saw the short runway and all the small aircraft at their tie downs he could a called a go around. Seems more like a planned error to me. But then I give flight crews too much credit sometimes.

Ive mistaken Pompano for Ft. Lauderdale Executive coming in from the shoreline already so it happens i guess.

I wonder how much damage that C-17 did to the subbase of the runway at KTPF. The C-17 weighs 134 tons empty and max landing weigt is 292 tons. MacDill's runways are designed and built to withstand that kind of pressure with aircraft weighing that heavy. I don't think KTPF is set up for that much weight hitting their much thinner runways construction. Then, I wonder who'll determine that KTPF's runway is in need of repair and who'll foot the bill...either way, us taxpayers for sure!

Oops! lol Well anyone who likes to frequent that small airfield for a bit of spotting got a nice treat. I freak out whenever a small jet lands at TSP and rush the 10 minutes down there to go see it.

(Duplicate Squawk Submitted)

U.S. Air Force C-17 Globemaster plane lands at Peter O. Knight Airport

Tampa, Florida - A huge military plane from New Jersey may have mistaken the tiny runway at Peter O' Knight airport for the runway at MacDill Air Force Base.


http://www.wtsp.com/news/topstories/article/264736/250/Large-military-plane-lands-at-Peter-O-Knight-Airport

(Duplicate Squawk Submitted)

Large plane, small runway

Large C-17 lands on wrong airport, a few miles from McDill AFB.

http://www.baynews9.com/content/news/baynews9/news/article.html/content/news/articles/bn9/2012/7/20/large_military_cargo.html

(Duplicate Squawk Submitted)

Pilots land C-17 at wrong airport

Pilots were attempting to land at MacDill Airforce Base in Tampa but landed at Peter O Knight (KTPF). The runways are only 4 degrees off of each other and they are not the first ones to make the mistake.

http://yfrog.com/mk7ekz

Mac dill traffic is dangerous low on Vfr and ifr over south and north east hillsborough co. , where Mac dill and tampa are located, in order to avoid being handled by tampa. If landed at tampas vandenburg some days you are dodging c 17s and kc 135s at 1000 feet and below who are on a 15 mile final for Mac dill. This story has already been removed from tbo.com who reported it.

They were just showing off the landing capability of the C 17.

I can imagine that if the USAF says anything at all it will be something like "Tired pilot from SE Asia trip, NJ based and unfamiliar with MacDill, etc"

in 67 a 707 driver went in to KOSU, Ohio State University, which is just over 9nm NW of the intended KCMH, Port Columbus International. This was on a visual approach and at that time both airports had the same runway configuration of 2 EW parallels and two crossing runways. OSU at that time had just over 4000' as the longest. An embarrassing call to tower after landing then removal of all seats etc and a test pilot to get 707 over to CMH on minimum fuel.

Needless to say....AMAZING!

Sounds like the Continental flight that landed at a Naval training field in Corpus Christi a few years ago. Muni field is W of town while they chose to land S of town.

Few months later Cont. put one down at the wrong location in Louisiana.

this is what you call real pilot error and also compass headiing error. I would suggest one of the airports changing it's runway number unless they want this to happen again. it might not end so pertty. Second, lets not forget when Boeing designed this they were thinking of short takeoffs and landings this aircriaft is well built, just hope it did not stress it too much.

Boeing took all of MD. Were you with the Apache when it was still Hughes prior to the MD takeover?

Anyone have information about JetBlue shacking syndrome?? please

What a way to get troops to the Times Forum next month if they have to just minutes away

These people did a great job of the landing, and take-off. I can only imagine that they were committed to land because of not knowing what the traffic was around them, otherwise, this could have done a T&G. They practice this all the time here at McChord AFB.

I know that the media is more interested in sensationalisms because that sells better then the real facts. The thought that a crew flying this airplane from Asia to the US nonstop could possibly slightly fatigued doesn't occur to these poeple. Pilots have made this same mistake on much shorter flights!

great flying anyway

It landed safely, no harm no foul, even gave some excitement to an otherwise sleepy day in Tampa

Could be career ending.

I have seen this happen twice in the area in which I used to live and an aborted landing as well in the same. Turning off the Flight Director at night is one such way this can happen when you have multiple airports in the vacinity and you get too "familiar". All these incidents were airlines and in one case a jet.

Is this part of "The Romance of Aviation"?

Great plane, great landing, pilot out of a job.

The OSU landing was a TWA 707, A 727 is a short field acft by comparison

Wonder if the pilots were super tired after their long flight back home... well, good thing these awesome aircraft has such small takeoff and landing runway requirement.

The problem here, for the Air Force, is how to retrieve their airplane. The C-17 apparently didn't need a very long runway to land - KTPF's longest runway is only 3410 feet, (3/21). 3410 feet may not be enough for takeoff however. They probably will either have to install rocket assist pods on it or take the plane apart and ship it back to MacDill AFB.

How could it had not been Pilot Error... I mean really, a 11,000' runway and a 3,300 foot runway look a lot different from the air... He should have suspected something was wrong on short final and executed a missed approach... Clearly pilot error.

well thta landing must of been tough going. I have seen 2 BA 747's land at EGBB the once looked so elegant on short final. Also i have seen an A380 on short finalm, That plane is one pig looking thing all the time more so at low speeds.

Sorry .. this is old news

Rookies!

Years ago, pilots frequently mistook the airport in Athens, Georgia for one in Anderson, South Carolina and the other way as well. They are not even close to each other.

This aircraft, fortunately, is designed to land and take off from short fields if it must.

This is not as uncommon as you would think. One notable occasion that springs to mind is when Pan Am Boeing 707 N725PA landed at Northolt instead of Heathrow back on 25th October 1960. A Lufthansa Boeing 707 attempted to do the same thing in April 1964

Would love to have seen this .. Makes for awsome photo ops.. Thanks USAF .. We salute you .. on a job well done .. for both the arrival and departure ! It is said the USAF has the technical solutions, for military strategy .. and this is the proof.

The media is still the stupidest looking one out of this entire thing.

I have landed here many times in my King Air C90B (twin Turboprop), and it is a challenging airport even in that airplane. I can't imagine how they will get the C-17 out of there??

The real issue is what was the cargo that the AF didn't want anyone paying any attention to. Make a look-like wrong landing. New crew takes off and flys out and the focus is on the crew and not on the plane. My oh my. What a tangled web we weave!

(Duplicate Squawk Submitted)

C-17 accidentally lands at wrong Florida airport

A C-17 Globemaster III headed for MacDill Air Force Base on Friday afternoon landed “inadvertently” at the much smaller Peter O. Knight GA airport located just a few miles away, according to airport authorities.

http://www.flyingmag.com/pilots-places/pilots-adventures-more/video-c-17-accidentally-lands-small-ga-airport

Empty with only min fuel to get her to MacDill - it was a smooth t/o. Seen plenty of them doing t&g's at Homestead.

(Duplicate Squawk Submitted)

C-17 Lands at the wrong airport

C-17 lands at Tampa's Peter O. Knight airport on a 3,580 ft runway instead of Mac Dill AFB on their 11,421 ft. runway.

http://www.9news.com/news/world/279177/347/Caught-on-Camera-Massive-military-plane-lands-at-wrong-airport

I wonder if they were asked to contact the tower.

Only in America, typical USAF all the gear, no idea!!! One of the expensive planes in the world and they can't even find the correct runway, very very funny