Land-Based Innovations for Stopping Commercial Aircraft

There have been many improvements and innovations in the specialized technology involved with the emergency stopping of commercial aircraft when they have had an unplanned excursion from the landing or take-off runway. While these overruns and undershoots do not occur at a high frequency, when they occur the results can be disastrous. For more than fifteen years, ESCO-Zodiac Aerospace has been a pioneer in the commercial aircraft stopping business. ESCO's Engineered Material Arresting Systems (EMAS) has led the way with a system that has gone beyond Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) acceptance in 1996 to become a proven life saver. In the more than half dozen times that an aircraft emergency has resulted in an aircraft in an EMAS bed, the system has worked successfully. More than 200 people have been protected from serious injury or death because of the presence of an EMAS in the Runway Safety Area (RSA) at the end of a runway. All aircraft that have entered an EMAS have subsequently flown from the airport in less than two weeks and continued on in revenue service. Because of a continuous improvement perspective on the part of the designer and manufacturer, there has been a continuing stream of innovations for the EMAS process. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the current state of the practice of EMAS design by highlighting the numerous recent innovations in the product, design and construction of EMAS systems. With as much detail as can be provided for a proprietary product, the innovations of the basic EMAS block will first be reviewed. Second, the EMAS design process improvements will be summarized. Finally, the alternatives for construction of an EMAS bed will be revealed. The paper will summarize these past innovations and also offer a quick look into the future of this well-developed safety system, touching on some of the possible future innovations.