The plane crash in Nepal, which killed 18 people, has once again drawn attention to table-top runways, which have been the site of major plane crashes across the world.
Table-top runways are located at a higher elevation than the surrounding terrain. This means that the runway slopes steeply on one or more sides, leaving little room for error for the pilot, as if the plane overshoots the runway, it will likely go down.
Five airports in India have table-top runways – Shimla, Calicut, Mangalore, Lengpui (Mizoram) and Pakyong (Sikkim). Of these, airports in Kerala and Mangalore have seen major accidents in the past. On May 22, 2010, Air India Express Flight 812 from Dubai to Mangalore crashed during landing, killing 158 passengers, including six crew members.
Ten years later, on August 7, 2020, another table-top runway became the site of tragedy. The Air India Express flight from Dubai to Kozhikode was part of the Vande Bharat Mission to bring back Indian citizens stranded due to the Covid pandemic. The plane skidded off the table-top runway and crashed down. Nineteen passengers and both pilots died, but 169 others survived.
The civil aviation regulator, Directorate General of Civil Aviation, conducts periodic reviews of table-top airports to ensure passenger safety. In 2022, a DGCA official had told the media that the aim behind the review was to prevent any unforeseen incidents and look for ways to make landing at these airports less challenging.
Madeira Airport in Portugal, which has a table-top runway, had an accident in 1977 when Air Portugal Flight 425 missed its target and crashed on the beach, killing 131 people.
Even in Nepal, which has a poor air travel safety record, there have been reports of accidents involving table-top runways before. On May 27, 2017, a cargo plane crashed at the Tenzing-Hillary airport in Solukhumbu, which has a table-top runway.
In the accident that happened this morning, the Bombardier CRJ 200 aircraft slid off the runway and caught fire, an airport spokesperson told NDTV. Tribhuvan Airport in Kathmandu, where the accident happened, is on top of a plateau and is surrounded by deep gorges and valleys. Kathmandu airport is one of the riskiest airports to land at and was the site of a major accident in 1992, when 167 passengers of a Pakistan International Airlines plane died. The Saurya Airlines plane that crashed today had crew and technical staff on board and was headed to Pokhara.
