Charter firm raises questions about RIL runway conditions

Following a runway overrun at Colorado’s Garfield County Regional Airport (RIL) on March 23, the operator of the Falcon 900 that departed Runway 26 after l

By AIN Staff • AIN Staff

May 2, 2007

Following a runway overrun at Colorado’s Garfield County Regional Airport (RIL) on March 23, the operator of the Falcon 900 that departed Runway 26 after landing is working with investigators and Dassault Falcon Jet to figure out what happened. The Falcon 900 was operated by Xojet, a charter/management company headquartered in San Carlos, Calif., and was on a repositioning flight from Scottsdale, Ariz. to Rifle, Colo., with two pilots and a flight attendant.

According to information provided by the pilots in the NTSB preliminary report, at Rifle the Falcon 900 weighed about 2,000 pounds less than maximum landing weight. The landing took place in night VMC at about 11:05 p.m. Although, according to the NTSB, “the pilot remembered observing a weather report that reported light rain at RIL,” he did not calculate the landing distance using wet runway numbers. He did make sure that the available landing distance was more than the required Part 135 landing distance even though the repositioning flight was conducted under Part 91.

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