Tag Archives for air traffic control.
A Southwest Airlines pilot narrowly averted disaster this morning when their Boeing 737-800 (registration N8517F) was preparing to land at Chicago Midway airport. Flight 2504 from Omaha was in the gradual pitch-up just prior to touchdown when it initiated a go around as a business jet crossed the runway. The plane climbed out, and landed safely 15 minutes later.
Why is it that airlines give up control of their aircraft to the government from the moment it pushes back to the moment it arrives at its destination?
When last week’s air disaster happened in D.C., the spotlight was thrown quickly on air traffic control – even without having any inkling that controller error contribution to the collision. That’s because there’s been a lot of attention paid recently to diversity efforts at the FAA, and because the President has railed against those sorts of efforts.
There’s a lot of misinformation about what happened. Here’s the basic truth, and how much it matters today.
After last night’s horrific collision of an American Eagle jet and a Black Hawk helicopter, there’s been a rush to pushing pet agendas. We don’t have a sufficient understanding of the causes of the incident yet to jump on a pet horse. Be very skeptical of anyone pushing solutions of laying blame at this stages.
SpaceX scrubbed the launch of its Falcon 9 rock on Sunday morning with just 11 seconds to blastoff – because air traffic control directed a Delta Air Lines flight from Los Angeles to Honolulu into the restricted airspace of its path.
On Saturday morning, Delta Air Lines flight 1070 from Detroit and United Airlines flight 1724 from San Francisco came perilously close to colliding above Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. Despite bad air traffic control instructions, the aircrafts’ onboard Traffic Collision Avoidance Systems (TCAS) alerted the pilots in time, preventing what could have been a catastrophic accident.
One week ago, air traffic control screwed up in San Diego, clearing two Southwest Airlines flights onto the same runway at the same time, leading to a high-speed aborted takeoff – but which could have been much worse.
American Airlines flight 2587 from Chicago O’Hare to Austin had a near-miss with a 1979 Cessna R182 that passed it with just about 400 feet of vertical separation on Wednesday.
The American Boeing 737 had been alerted to the traffic in the area, but lost it descending into fog on final approach. They responded to a traffic collision avoidance system (TCAS) alert as the Cessna flew directly into their approach path, almost right below.
Tensions between Nigeria and Libya have flared after Libya seemingly used air traffic control to gain an edge in the Africa Cup of Nations qualifying soccer match between the two national teams.
Nigeria’s national team was flying to Benghazi – and had its permission to land pulled at the last minute, sending them to an airport 135 miles away (that wasn’t even their diversion airport) and denying them accommodations on the ground where they were left stuck for about 19 hours. Nigeria’s Super Eagles ultimately declined to play the match.
Meanwhile, all of Nav Canada facilities went electronic 15 years ago (and all control towers and TRACONs even earlier). Their solution is used in Australia, Italy, the U.K. and Dubai. We could license the Canadian solution, or other commercial ones, but instead the FAA has been working contracting for their own solution since three years before the Beastie Boys were fighting for your right to party.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
