Latest news with #nearMiss
BBC News
27-05-2025
- General
- BBC News
Near miss with train workers at Bookham Tunnel to be investigated
A near miss involving three track workers and a passenger train in Surrey is to be investigated by the around 11:44 BST on 29 April, a train operated by South Western Railway was involved in the incident at Bookham hearing the approaching train, two of the track workers entered refuges built into the tunnel walls, while the third worker leant against the tunnel wall as the train workers, who were not hurt, had been walking back to Bookham station after completing work on the telephones located at either end of the tunnel. A line blockage had been arranged with the signaller to stop trains from running through the tunnel, but it was later discovered that this had been arranged for the nearby Mickleham Tunnel and did not cover Bookham government's investigation, which sits independent from any undertaken by the railway industry, will look to identify the sequence of events which led to the will also investigate the actions of those involved, the way in which the work was planned and any underlying management factors.
Washington Post
23-05-2025
- General
- Washington Post
A Norwegian man awoke to find a grounded cargo ship had narrowly missed his home
OSLO, Norway — A Norwegian man awoke to find that a cargo ship had run aground and narrowly missed crashing into his home along the Trondheim Fjord's coast. Johan Helberg told Norwegian broadcaster NRK that he'd slept through the whole thing and only woke up when a neighbor started ringing his doorbell.
Daily Mail
20-05-2025
- Health
- Daily Mail
Latest terrifying airport near-miss saw two jets almost collide in full view of Manhattan skyline
In the latest terrifying airport near-miss, a jet in New York was forced to abruptly abort takeoff as another was still on LaGuardia Airport's runway. Passengers on board Republic Airways Flight 4736 on May 6 were thrown forward in their seats as the pilot slammed on the brakes at 12.35am. The sudden stop occurred because a United Airlines aircraft was still taxiing across the runway, according to the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board. One jolted passenger, Renee Hoffer, described the incident as 'as hard as any car accident I've been in,' after she wound up in the emergency room the next day. Hoffer told Associated Press that she visited the ER with neck pain and a numb left arm on May 6, the day after the plane came to an abrupt halt. As the incident occurred, the air traffic controller was heard telling the Republic Airways pilot, 'Sorry, I thought United had cleared well before that,' News 10 ABC reported. A ground controller on a separate radio frequency was, at the same time, guiding the United aircraft to a new taxiway after it had missed its intended exit. Passengers were disembarked from the plane, but Hoffer said gate agents refused to offer any accommodation or hotel vouchers. She said that the airline blamed weather circumstances for the incident, despite another passenger who had an app on her phone that showed another plane was on the runway. Hoffer told ABC that she had been battling with customer service since the incident and neither the airline nor the FAA had answered her complaints. It is unclear why passengers disembarked or if they were re-booked onto another flight. She continues to suffer from a pinched nerve in her neck that ER doctors identified. The FAA and NTSB said that an investigation into the incident is ongoing. Republic Airways did not immediately respond to request for comment. The close call comes not long after a Delta flight near Reagan National Airport had a near miss moments after takeoff. Carrying 137 people, the flight departed for Minneapolis-St. Paul, Minnesota, when it received a sudden emergency notification of a nearby aircraft. Alarms went off inside the cockpit of the passenger flight just minutes after taking off, due to how close the T-38 jet came to the plane. The close call happened just south of the airport and close to the spot where an American Airlines jet collided with a army helicopter in January, killing 67 people. According to tracking data from FlightRadar 24, the Air Force jet flew past the Delta plane in excess of 350 miles per hour. The FAA said the military jet was in the area alongside three others for a flyover at Arlington National Cemetery. In air traffic control chatter heard via a Delta pilot can be heard saying: 'Was there an actual aircraft about 500 feet below us?'. An air traffic controller responds: 'Affirmative'. The latest incident follows a streak of aircraft crashes and close calls since the start of the year including the one at Reagan National Airport. At the time of the collision, a single air traffic controller was simultaneously monitoring both the helicopter and plane traffic. Those tasks are usually handled between two people from 10am until 9:30pm, according to an early FAA report seen by The New York Times. After 9:30pm the duties are typically combined and left to one person as the airport sees less traffic later in the night. A supervisor reportedly decided to combine those duties before the scheduled cutoff time however, and allowed one air traffic controller to leave work early. The FAA report said that staffing configuration 'was not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic'.
Associated Press
19-05-2025
- Associated Press
Passenger jet had to abort takeoff to avoid runway collision at New York's LaGuardia Airport
Federal officials are investigating why two planes got dangerously close on a runway at New York's LaGuardia Airport earlier this month despite the airport being equipped with an advanced surface radar system that's designed to help prevent such close calls. Both the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board said Monday that they are investigating the May 6 incident when a Republic Airways jet had to abort takeoff because a United Airlines plane was still taxiing across the runway. In audio from the tower that ABC obtained from the website the air traffic control said to the pilot of the Republic Airways jet: 'Sorry, I thought United had cleared well before that.' At the time that controller was directing the Republic Airways jet to takeoff, a ground controller on a different radio frequency was directing the United plane to a new taxiway after it missed the first one it was supposed to use to exit the runway. Neither airline involved responded to questions about the incident and the airport deferred all questions to the FAA. The number of close calls in recent years has created serious concerns for the FAA, NTSB and other safety experts. The NTSB's investigation of a February 2023 close call in Austin highlighted the concerns, but there have been a number of other high-profile near misses. In one case, a Southwest Airlines jet coming in for a landing in Chicago narrowly avoided smashing into a business jet crossing the runway. LaGuardia is one of just 35 airports across the country equipped with the FAA's best technology to prevent such runway incursions. The ASDS-X system uses a variety of technology to help controllers track planes and vehicles on the ground. At the other 490 U.S. airports with a control tower, air traffic controllers have to rely on more low-tech tools like a pair of binoculars to keep track of aircraft on the ground because the systems are expensive. Expanding the systems to more airports is something Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy would like to do if Congress signs off on his multi-billion-dollar plan to overhaul the nation's aging air traffic control system. But it's clear the technology is not perfect because close calls continue happening. The FAA is taking a number of additional steps to try to reduce the number of close calls, and it plans to install an additional warning system at LaGuardia in the future. But the rate of runway incursions per 1 million takeoffs and landings has remained around 30 for a decade. The rate got as high as 35 in 2017 and 2018. But generally there are fewer than 20 of the most serious kind of incursions where a collision was narrowly avoided or there was a significant potential for a crash, according to the FAA. That number did hit 22 in 2023 but fell to just 7 last year. To help, there are efforts to develop a system that will warn pilots directly about traffic on a runway instead of alerting the controller and relying on them to relay the warning. That could save precious seconds. But the FAA has not yet certified a system to warn pilots directly that Honeywell International has been developing for years. The worst accident in aviation history occurred in 1977 on the Spanish island of Tenerife, when a KLM 747 began its takeoff roll while a Pan Am 747 was still on the runway; 583 people died when the planes collided in thick fog.
The Independent
19-05-2025
- General
- The Independent
Passenger jet had to abort takeoff to avoid runway collision at New York's LaGuardia Airport
Federal officials are investigating why two planes got dangerously close on a runway at New York 's LaGuardia Airport earlier this month despite the airport being equipped with an advanced surface radar system that's designed to help prevent such close calls. Both the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board said Monday that they are investigating the May 6 incident when a Republic Airways jet had to abort takeoff because a United Airlines plane was still taxiing across the runway. In audio from the tower that ABC obtained from the website the air traffic control said to the pilot of the Republic Airways jet: 'Sorry, I thought United had cleared well before that.' At the time that controller was directing the Republic Airways jet to takeoff, a ground controller on a different radio frequency was directing the United plane to a new taxiway after it missed the first one it was supposed to use to exit the runway. Neither airline involved responded to questions about the incident and the airport deferred all questions to the FAA. The number of close calls in recent years has created serious concerns for the FAA, NTSB and other safety experts. The NTSB's investigation of a February 2023 close call in Austin highlighted the concerns, but there have been a number of other high-profile near misses. In one case, a Southwest Airlines jet coming in for a landing in Chicago narrowly avoided smashing into a business jet crossing the runway. LaGuardia is one of just 35 airports across the country equipped with the FAA's best technology to prevent such runway incursions. The ASDS-X system uses a variety of technology to help controllers track planes and vehicles on the ground. At the other 490 U.S. airports with a control tower, air traffic controllers have to rely on more low-tech tools like a pair of binoculars to keep track of aircraft on the ground because the systems are expensive. Expanding the systems to more airports is something Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy would like to do if Congress signs off on his multi-billion-dollar plan to overhaul the nation's aging air traffic control system. But it's clear the technology is not perfect because close calls continue happening. The FAA is taking a number of additional steps to try to reduce the number of close calls, and it plans to install an additional warning system at LaGuardia in the future. But the rate of runway incursions per 1 million takeoffs and landings has remained around 30 for a decade. The rate got as high as 35 in 2017 and 2018. But generally there are fewer than 20 of the most serious kind of incursions where a collision was narrowly avoided or there was a significant potential for a crash, according to the FAA. That number did hit 22 in 2023 but fell to just 7 last year. To help, there are efforts to develop a system that will warn pilots directly about traffic on a runway instead of alerting the controller and relying on them to relay the warning. That could save precious seconds. But the FAA has not yet certified a system to warn pilots directly that Honeywell International has been developing for years. The worst accident in aviation history occurred in 1977 on the Spanish island of Tenerife, when a KLM 747 began its takeoff roll while a Pan Am 747 was still on the runway; 583 people died when the planes collided in thick fog.
