Runway is a long rectangular strip on the ground with a hard surface where an aircraft can land and take off at an airport. It is built by using often asphalt, concrete, or a mixture of both.
Markings on Runway:
1) CENTER LINE:
Center line is a dashed white line at the center of the runway. As name explains, this line is to recognize the center of the runway. This line looks similar to the center line we see on a highway roads or main roads of any city.
2) RUNWAY NUMBER:
A runway number is given depending on the direction of a runway on a compass. If the runway is in a direction of " 270° " then the runway number will be " 27 " eliminating the last zero. If the direction is " 274° " then the number is given by taking the nearest tenth digit.
For ex: 274° is taken as 270 = 27
278° is taken as 280 = 28
74° is taken as 070 = 07 (UK) or 7 (USA)
77° is taken as 080 = 08 (UK) or 8 (USA)
3) PARALLEL RUNWAYS:
Same number cannot be given to more than one runway as pilots will get confused. But, At few airports have more than one runway in same direction. Such runways are called Parallel runways. In such cases, runways are represented as " 27R " which means " 27 Right ", " 27L " which means " 27 Left ", and " 27C " which means " 27 Center ".
4) THRESHOLD BARS:
At the beginning of every runway we can see few white bars, These are called Threshold Bars. These bars helps the pilots and crew to understand the runway width. According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Threshold bar measurements are as follows :
Runway Width Number of Stripes
60 feet (18 m) 4
75 feet (23 m) 6
100 feet (30 m) 8
150 feet (45 m) 12
200 feet (60 m) 16
5) AIM POINT:
Aim point in the actual point where pilots should aim to make the touch down of their aircraft. This point can be seen with three boxes in UK and with two single boxs in other nations.
6) TOUCHDOWN ZONE:
Not every pilot can land their aircraft exactly at the aim point every single time and that's quite difficult too. So, This touchdown zone can be used by the pilots to land their aircraft. These line markings will be decreasing one by one for every 500 Feet which explains, how close the aircraft is to the edge of the runway.
7) EXTENTION MARKINGS:
DISPLACED THRESHOLD MARKINGS:
This area on a runway is used for aircraft taxing and to start the aircraft run to make the take-off. Threshold area should not be used to land an aircraft as it is not much capable enough to withstand the landing of an aircraft as the remaining runway.
BLAST PAD:
An aircraft is not permitted to enter the blast pad area unless in the emergency situation because blast pad area is most alike displaced threshold area. The main reason of having a blast pad area is to avoid the damage occurs by the jet blast of an aircraft to any ground equipment or humans standing at the end of the runways.
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