What do you mean by catastrophe?
If they are good they can land a 737 in as short as 3300 feet using 40 degrees flap, spoilers, and thrust reversers.
Santos Dumont Airport (IATA: SDU; Rio, Brazil) has a runway that is only 4341 ft. long. It receives 737s on a regular basis.
Would you consider them "good" if they can't find the right airport?
If they drop all their passengers and cargo they can easily take off within about 3,000 feet.
From the article:
Only after unloading the plane, did Mr. Scheiffer notice the gravity of the situation, noting “we have all deplaned from @SouthwestAir 4013, and the mood is somber now that we realized we were 40 feet from the edge of a cliff.”
I am sure that the landing would not be considered flawless were the aircraft to travel just 40 feet more. It's so bad that they cannot safely take off. What are they going to do, to extend the runway or to cut the airplane into pieces?
But the normal flap setting is 30 degrees, unless they know they are landing at a short runway.
If they are good they can land a 737 in as short as 3300 feet using 40 degrees flap, spoilers, and thrust reversers.
Santos Dumont Airport (IATA: SDU; Rio, Brazil) has a runway that is only 4341 ft. long. It receives 737s on a regular basis.
A B737 is capable of landing on short runways IF properly configured and pilot technique flown for a short field landing on a 4000 ft runway.
If you think you are landing on a 10,000 ft runway with plenty of room and have the plane configured for an easy landing with long roll out that minimizes wear and tear on the airplane like Southwest pilots are taught to do and you are actually landing on a 4000 ft runway - well, lets just say things could get interesting.
Pilot hubby says landing is not the problem....taking off from such a runway would be the difficult thing.