Narrative:

We were holding short of runway 20 waiting to depart on runway 16 at ric. There was another flight in front of us who was also waiting to take off. They were cleared for takeoff. We were next in line and told to 'cross runway 20; runway 16 cleared for takeoff.' we cleared both the approach and departure ends and paths of runways 20 and 16; then proceeded to cross runway 20. Just before taking runway 16; the captain looked left to double check as I was checking to the right to ensure the runway was still clear. The captain immediately stopped the aircraft when he saw an aircraft on short final as we were almost onto runway 16. At the same time; tower told him to go around. We held our position to verify that the aircraft was going around and to make sure no collision hazard existed. We reconfirmed with the tower that we were cleared for takeoff and continued without incident. The approach corridor for runway 16 was obviously not completely visible at the angle we were at with the departure runway and therefore we didn't see the approaching aircraft until he had gotten pretty close in on the approach. Since we did not see the approaching aircraft until they were on very short final; we did not know to decline the takeoff clearance and continue holding short of the runway. Since we had been holding short of runway 20 on alpha behind another rj for some time; we didn't see the aircraft turning on final and didn't hear him check in because we were busy amending our assigned altitude given to us by tower while holding short of the runway.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: EMB135 flight crew departing RIC on Runway 20 experiences a conflict with an aircraft that had previously been cleared to land Runway 20. The crew detects the landing aircraft on short final and stops short of the runway and Tower sends the landing aircraft around.

Narrative: We were holding short of Runway 20 waiting to depart on Runway 16 at RIC. There was another flight in front of us who was also waiting to take off. They were cleared for takeoff. We were next in line and told to 'cross Runway 20; Runway 16 cleared for takeoff.' We cleared both the approach and departure ends and paths of Runways 20 and 16; then proceeded to cross Runway 20. Just before taking runway 16; the captain looked left to double check as I was checking to the right to ensure the runway was still clear. The captain immediately stopped the aircraft when he saw an aircraft on short final as we were almost onto runway 16. At the same time; tower told him to go around. We held our position to verify that the aircraft was going around and to make sure no collision hazard existed. We reconfirmed with the tower that we were cleared for takeoff and continued without incident. The approach corridor for Runway 16 was obviously not completely visible at the angle we were at with the departure runway and therefore we didn't see the approaching aircraft until he had gotten pretty close in on the approach. Since we did not see the approaching aircraft until they were on very short final; we did not know to decline the takeoff clearance and continue holding short of the runway. Since we had been holding short of runway 20 on alpha behind another RJ for some time; we didn't see the aircraft turning on final and didn't hear him check in because we were busy amending our assigned altitude given to us by tower while holding short of the runway.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.