Airport safety
In 1996, federal regulators certified Engineered Materials Arresting Systems (EMAS), developed to safely halt planes that overshoot runways by using deep beds of crushable concrete or silica installed at the end of a runway. The first such system was installed at New York’s JFK Airport that same year. Just last year, EMAS saved 50 passengers aboard a United commuter jet that overran the runway in Roanoke, Virginia. Similarly, four passengers aboard a corporate jet were saved in Boca Raton.
Since being developed 20 years ago, EMAS has been installed at no less than 70 airports across the U.S. and saved countless lives. Despite this, Miami International Airport (MIA), Florida’s busiest airport and our region’s economic engine, has not installed EMAS. The time has long passed for our county commission to seek federal and state funding to install EMAS.
More likely than not, the tragic loss of life at MIA last weekend could have been prevented if EMAS had been installed at the end of Runway 30, where the Prime Air Boeing 767 hurdled through fences and onto local streets before finally coming to a stop…