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A B757 captain reported being concerned about his rejected takeoff option when he noticed the last 3000 ft of his takeoff runway at den was snow covered. He does not remember seeing any notice of this before takeoff.
| Attributes | |
| ACN | 866578 |
| Time | |
| Date | 200912 |
| Local Time Of Day | 0601-1200 |
| Place | |
| Locale Reference | DEN.Airport |
| State Reference | CO |
| Aircraft 1 | |
| Make Model Name | B757-200 |
| Operating Under FAR Part | Part 121 |
| Flight Phase | Takeoff |
| Flight Plan | IFR |
| Person 1 | |
| Function | Captain Pilot Flying |
| Qualification | Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP) |
| Experience | Flight Crew Last 90 Days 90 Flight Crew Total 25000 Flight Crew Type 7000 |
| Events | |
| Anomaly | No Specific Anomaly Occurred All Types |
Narrative:
Den had snow earlier in the morning with snow removal in progress. This flight was originally planned for a 240.0 pound takeoff but misconnecting passengers reduced the tog by almost 4;000 pounds. Assigned runway 25 for takeoff which is 11;000 ft long. During takeoff role and approaching 5000 ft remaining; we saw snow covering what appeared to be the last 3000 ft of the runway. Being heavy; aircraft was rotated just where the snow began covering the runway. After airborne; we rechecked the ATIS and could not find any mention of snow covering the end of runway 25. The aircraft behind us reported that we entered a cloud of snow and did not become visible until we climbed out of it. If an abort had been executed close to V1; it might have become questionable about this flight's ability to stop on the concrete remaining. Den's runways are long but long range den flights regularly see the last 3000 ft of a runway prior to rotating. If the snow cover was reported in the NOTAMS; then we missed it but that is not hard to do with so many minor ones just overloading the system and a pilot's ability to separate all of them into must know and annoying legality ones.
Original NASA ASRS Text
Title: A B757 Captain reported being concerned about his rejected takeoff option when he noticed the last 3000 ft of his takeoff runway at DEN was snow covered. He does not remember seeing any notice of this before takeoff.
Narrative: DEN had snow earlier in the morning with snow removal in progress. This flight was originally planned for a 240.0 LB takeoff but misconnecting passengers reduced the TOG by almost 4;000 LBS. Assigned Runway 25 for takeoff which is 11;000 ft long. During takeoff role and approaching 5000 ft remaining; we saw snow covering what appeared to be the last 3000 ft of the runway. Being heavy; aircraft was rotated just where the snow began covering the runway. After airborne; we rechecked the ATIS and could not find any mention of snow covering the end of Runway 25. The aircraft behind us reported that we entered a cloud of snow and did not become visible until we climbed out of it. If an abort had been executed close to V1; it might have become questionable about this flight's ability to stop on the concrete remaining. DEN's runways are long but long range DEN flights regularly see the last 3000 ft of a runway prior to rotating. If the snow cover was reported in the NOTAMS; then we missed it but that is not hard to do with so many minor ones just overloading the system and a pilot's ability to separate all of them into must know and annoying legality ones.
Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 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.