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ATC Causes VERY Near miss betw Major & Regional

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Voice Of Reason

Reading Is Fundamental !
Joined
Sep 21, 2004
Posts
1,369
5 hrs ago news posted only in one small news site:

Officials: Planes avoid mid-air crash
The Associated Press
Article Launched: 03/06/2008 021:27 AM MST

OBERLIN, Ohio—Two airplanes carrying more than 120 passengers narrowly averted a mid-air collision east of Pittsburgh after an air traffic control trainee told a Delta Air Lines pilot to turn into the path of an oncoming plane, officials said. The Delta pilot made a nosedive and missed the plane by about 400 feet, the Federal Aviation Administration said. The other pilot also took evasive action, the FAA said.
A cockpit collision avoidance system alerted the pilots to the danger.
Delta Flight 1654 was en route from Cincinnati to LaGuardia International Airport in New York Tuesday morning and was carrying 57 passengers. The other plane, PSA Flight 2273, was flying from Wilkes-Barre, Pa., to Charlotte, N.C. It had 70 people on board.
PSA is a subsidiary of Tempe, Ariz.-based US Airways Group, Inc. Delta Air Lines Inc. is based in Atlanta.
The controller only had about a year on the job, said Melissa Ott, National Air Traffic Controllers spokeswoman at the Cleveland Air Route Traffic Control Center in Oberlin.
"We watched the recording of the incident three times and each time I said, 'Oh my God,'" Ott said. "It was the closest call I have ever seen in my 18 years of air traffic control."
FAA spokeswoman Elizabeth Isham Cory called the incident an operational error. She said a second controller was working with the trainee at the time.
"This ended with the aircraft taking the appropriate action," Cory said. "The controllers will be retrained." :erm:
A Delta spokeswoman said the passengers "were never in danger."
 
No, never in danger. Could the TCAS have been deferred on both airplanes? Yes. Then where would we be?
 
A Delta spokeswoman said the passengers "were never in danger."

Of course not.

The photo of the PSA 727 in a flaming nosedive comes to mind. At that moment, everyone was still alive. In fact, there was no imminent danger until the plane hit the ground.

Dumbazz Delta spokeswoman.
 
I've always loved the term "near miss." Isn't that a collision? "The two planes nearly missed before they collided....film at 11."
 
TCAS or not, if they were within 400' at altitude, then I beg to differ.

Well you can't believe what you read in the press (remember Lufthansa landing in the 150mph crosswind last week?), but a mere 400 feet AFTER taking action given by the TCAS is pretty ridiculous if it's true. Yikes!
 
What was the lateral separation? 1000 ft? 3000 ft? 50 ft? I have been a passenger on my airline MD80 and a commuter coming at us went 50 ft below the nose and left wing of our aircraft and no evasive maneuvers were made by either aircraft off the water near LAX about 14,000 ft climbing out of SNA. The passenger on the left side about jumped out of his seat. I saw the plane approaching from the right and knew the captain, who always called traffic in sight so he didn't have to level off. I was braced for impact but we missed only because of the "big sky theory". I never told the captain or anybody because he hated flying with me questioning his lax flying techniques. This was before TCAS.
 
I never told the captain or anybody because he hated flying with me questioning his lax flying techniques. This was before TCAS.

I guess the "good ol' days" weren't that "good."

"Gear up, flaps up, shut up."

Worked out pretty well.
 
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Of course not.

The photo of the PSA 727 in a flaming nosedive comes to mind. At that moment, everyone was still alive. In fact, there was no imminent danger until the plane hit the ground.

Dumbazz Delta spokeswoman.

I remember that one. Wrong Cessna in sight, I believe.
 
Why did the pilots let it get this far? Shouldn't they have been more proactive when they started to get TAs?


What are you talking about? Sounds like the crew did a great job. First, What makes you think that they were not proactive? Second, you assume that they even got a TA at all... It is possible it happened so fast that they never got a TA and the computer went straight to the RA mode. Finally, You can't "be proactive" EVERYTIME you get a TA, that is not how the system is designed, if you did that, you would only cause more problems. You must not fly in very busy airspace...on the East Coast, I would guess that you get AT LEAST one "TA" a day, probably more.

It appears to me that the TCAS system operated as designed. It is a "Collission Avoidance System" not a "conflict avoidance system", therefore nobody hit anything...TCAS worked perfect. ATC on the other hand...wtf! And why isn't the media jumping on the fact that the FAA allows the TCAS system to be MEL'd. Actually, why do we allow ANY aircraft to fly without it? It should be mandatory equipment to fly into Class B airspace PERIOD! sorry AOPA.

On another note...I think this is the type of incident that ALPA should be putting out press releases and making the pilots available to the media for interviews...ALPA should be saying "HELL YES these passengers were in danger and HELL YES 150+ people almost died today and PRAISE JESUS that there were FOUR highly trained ALPA pilots at the controls today and the FAA and Delta spokespersons are smoking crack if they think this is not a big deal!!!" These pilots should be on Good Morning America, Larry King, and Leno. We should be making a big deal out of this so that people understand what our role is in the aviation system...so they know that it ain't just the computer flying the airplane!

Later
 
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I've always loved the term "near miss." Isn't that a collision? "The two planes nearly missed before they collided....film at 11."

That is near as in proximity and miss as in did not collide.
A plane is a flat surface or a wood working tool. An airplane, aeroplane or aircraft is a heavier than air machine capable of flight.
 
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I've always loved the term "near miss." Isn't that a collision? "The two planes nearly missed before they collided....film at 11."

Yeah, did they nearly miss each other, or nearly hit each other.

They need to start classifying these as near hits! That'll get some attention!
 

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