On June 20, the pilots of a Cairo-bound EgyptAir Boeing 777 mistakenly taxied just 37 feet shy of Runway 22R, where it would have been in the path of a Lufthansa jet speeding toward takeoff in the June 20 incident, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement to The Post.
The investigation’s results were forwarded to the Egyptian authorities responsible for regulating EgyptAir operations, the FAA said in a statement to The Post.
It was unclear what actions the Egyptians took in the incident, and EgyptAir officials in New York did not respond to a request for comment.
The Lufthansa Airbus stopped just 1,500 feet from the EgyptAir plane — a distance the jet could have covered in about 6 seconds at its normal takeoff speed of 180 mph.
The Lufthansa crew brought the Airbus A340 to a screeching halt, partly by jamming on its brakes so hard that they overheated.
“No! Whoa-whoa-whoa-whoa!” someone in the tower shouted over the radio as the EgyptAir plane crossed a hold-short line, where it should have stopped before heading to the runway.
“Cancel takeoff! Cancel takeoff plans!” a frightened air controller yelled to the Munich-bound Lufthansa pilots.
The FAA rated the incident a “Category C” runway incursion, and says “there was ample time and/or distance to avoid a collision.”
Other pilots were rattled by the incident. “Those two were coming together,” one radioed moments later. Another called it “quite a show.”
A collision would have been an epic disaster: The Lufthansa plane had 286 passengers and crew, while the EgyptAir 777 was able to carry up to 346 passengers and crew.
The incident was one of three runway incursions reported out of 400,000 flight operations at Kennedy in 2011. The other two incursions were rated “D,” less serious than the EgyptAir incident.
The FAA has successfully campaigned against runway incursions in the last decade.
As of Sept. 22, the FAA counted seven runway incursions at US airports in 2011 it rated as “A” or “B,” the most dangerous categories. That compares to 67 “A” and “B” incursions reported in 2000.