World's Scariest Runways

[Dan Gould]

Our own San Francisco International has two runways that stick out a ways into the bay. So what, you say? Well, they run parallel and right next to each other. A rather frightening setup, I always thought.

They also like to land the planes side-by-side on them. I've seen it many times from the freeway.

That really surprises me because there are horizontal as well as vertical separation rules. Unless they stagger the landings.

[BruceH]

Our own San Francisco International has two runways that stick out a ways into the bay. So what, you say? Well, they run parallel and right next to each other. A rather frightening setup, I always thought.

They also like to land the planes side-by-side on them. I've seen it many times from the freeway.

That really surprises me because there are horizontal as well as vertical separation rules. Unless they stagger the landings.

Rules are made to be broken I guess.

There's a hill you go down after taking the Burlingame exit from 280---many is the time I've seen jets coming in for a landing from there because the hill looks right down into the approach corridor. And occasionally there does seem to be more than one, though I can't say I've ever seen them LITERALLY side-by-side, but pretty close. It must be something to live in one of the houses on that hill, because they have an amazing view of what must be one or two hundred jets a day coming in for a landing over the water. AND you don't hear a thing because they have their engines throttled down (not like in South San Francisco which is right under a major take-off corridor, so the engines are throttled UP to make the climb, screaming all the way.) Just driving through South SF or San Bruno I must have seen more jets close up in one year than in my whole previous lifetime in New England.