Eyewitness News investigation prompts FAA promise to install safety feature at area airports

NEW YORK (WABC) -- Eyewitness News was the first to raise the red flag about a potential safety issue at our local airports after our investigation uncovered that crucial runway red lights used to keep pilots out of the path of other planes were not being installed quickly enough.

But that's about to change.

As we've been reporting, these critical runway safety lights are already operating at smaller airports, but some of the busiest in the nation don't have them, including LaGuardia, JFK and Newark.

Now, the FAA says New York is a priority.

Recently, the pilot of a Caribbean Airways jet never heard tower instructions to stop as he crossed the runway, right into the path of a JetBlue plane traveling at near take-off speed.

"Ninety percent of these things can be eliminated with technology," former commercial pilot Bob Ober said. "You spend the money and do it right, there's no reason for a delay in doing this."

But the FAA is way behind schedule on these lights, despite Congress giving $36 million to install them at New York's three major airports. They should have been operational at LaGuardia and JFK by January 2014, and then by April of last year at Newark.

"The FAA just bungled this," Senator Charles Schumer said. "There was enough money to do this, but they made a higher priority at installing them at less busy airports."

Now, Schumer says he's gotten a commitment from the FAA to get the lights installed and operational at all three airports by year's end.

"They had no good excuse as to why this wasn't installed earlier," Schumer said. "I know you folks at Channel 7 lit a fire under them, we did too, now they are doing the right thing."

While the FAA fell further and further behind in installing the safety lights, the number of close-calls on the runways have soared. At JFK, runway incursions more than doubled from seven in 2013 to 18 last year. LaGuardia incidents jumped from seven to 13 during that same period, while Newark had the biggest spike from seven in 2013 to 19 last year.

The FAA says none was severe, but the increase underscores the urgency in getting these runway stop lights.

"There is a dramatic need for these," Schumer said. "And we don't want to be in the situation where there are deaths and injuries that could have been prevented had these lights been installed."

Airports where the lights have been installed have seen a decline in the number of runway incursions.