Talk:Tenerife disaster

As a software engineer interested in traffic safety, this report intrigues me. Did you know that GPS is accurate enough to tell whether a plane is on the runway, about to turn on to it, or taking off?

You only need accuracy to within 50 feet for that, and GPS is much more accurate. All GPS devices I've seen also can calculate speed and direction.

Using GPS for position, speed and direction could revolutionize air traffic control. --Ed Poor 11:32, 27 March 2007 (EDT)

At time time such technology was not in use at Tenerife Airport. By the way, I'm fixing the article because it says the primary cause was poor English, despite a consensus of the International board responsible for the investigation deemed pilot error the primary cause (only the Dutch members of the board stated so, I'll get to conflict of interest later). The Dutch said the controllers couldn't speak English well (despite post-crash interveiws as part of the investigation demonstrating their English was sufficient) because they needed a reason to explain why the KLM plane took off when it did, which was the captain being in a hurry to get to the destination despite warnings from fellow drew members. The Dutch goverment still has a 6% stake in KLM, hence they would not point responsibility at themselves so they blamed ATC's english. Both the Spanish and American investigators agreed radio interference and static was a minor factor because it impeded granting permission to take off delaying enough for fog to arrive, resulting in poor visiblity (the KLM pilot did not see the Pan Am plane b/c the fog)