US fighters 'yards from BA plane'

[cal04]

Two American Air Force fighter planes came close to a British Airways regional passenger aircraft amid "general confusion", an official accident report has said. The two F15E Eagle aircraft climbed above the level to which they were cleared to fly and passed within about 1,000 yards of the BA CitiExpress (now BA Connect) Embraer 145 aircraft which was flying at 21,000ft near Bedford, the Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) report said.

The Embraer captain, who was carrying 35 passengers, informed air traffic control he had just seen an F15 pass the nose of the Embraer aircraft about 100ft below and "no more than about 200 yards ahead, descending," said the report. The AAIB went on: "Inadequate transmission and acknowledgements of clearances within the formation plus the crews' inability to fly either as a coherent formation or as two independent aircraft during the diversion were major contributory factors to the ensuing general confusion.

"Also poor use was made of the highly sophisticated aids available to the crews in monitoring fuel loads, monitoring ground position and using airborne radar." The report was also critical of air traffic control at Lakenheath in Suffolk for a communication failure which "contributed to the subsequent radar identification problems". The incident took place on the morning of January 27, 2005. The two fighter planes were flying from RAF Lakenheath for a close air support training sortie at Otterburn Range near Newcastle upon Tyne.

During the training exercise, both aircraft became low on fuel and decided to divert due to poor weather and air traffic delays at Lakenheath. It was some time after this that the Embraer captain reported to London-based air traffic controllers that a military fighter aircraft had passed close in front of him. Eventually the two fighter planes landed safely at RAF Valley at Holyhead, Anglesey. The AAIB report said the decision to divert was left too late. The report went on: "Because they were critically short of fuel, the (US) aircraft climbed through their cleared flight level, without transponding, entered controlled airspace and conflicted with the Embraer 145."

http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=204572006

[bpilgrim]

1. does it make sense to climb when you are low on fuel?

:shrug:

either way this story is just another sign of the sorry times...

peace

[SIU_Blue]

2. Yes, it does....

As you climb, the air becomes thinner and the engines become more efficient, thus saving fuel. This is the same reason that commercial flights are flown above 10,000 feet, usually 25-40,000. Hope this information helps. I only fly small private planes, but the principle is the same.

-J

[bpilgrim]

3. thanks for the info

:toast:

peace

[Thor_MN]

4. Someone with greater knowledge might clear this up 100%, but

IIRC, flights operate at certain levels depending upon the direction they are flying. That way, aircraft at the same altitude are moving generally in the same direction, kind of liking making under/over passes on the highway so you don't have to have four way stops.

When they chose to divert, they may have needed to change altitude due to their changing direction.

[SIU_Blue]

6. Clarification....

below 10,000 feet flights which are headed 0-179 degrees (east) fly at odd levels +500 feet. (3500 feet, 5500 feet)and flights which are headed 180-359 degrees (west) fly at even levels +500 feet (4500 feet, 6500 feet).

The reason for the +500 feet is that IFR traffic (all commercial flights) fly at even levels (5000, 6000, 25,000 feet.)

All IFR traffic altitudes are assigned by Air Traffic Control. Any aircraft diverting will be assigned an altitude which does not conflict with other flights.

The confusion here may be caused by different controllers/radio frequencies being used by the military aircraft and the Commercial aircraft.

Once again, hope this helps.

-J

[SicSemperTyrannis]

5. Why were they "critically short of fuel"? Where had they been?

[SIU_Blue]

7. one thing you learn as an aviation enthusiast/pilot

is that the press always:

A) is factually incorrect
B) exaggerates the s%^& out of everything

when it comes to aviation.

Most likely, the planes requested a priority landing because they were short on fuel after the diversion. Not the same as an emergency, which would have been declared if they were really "critically short" on fuel.

-J

[muriel_volestrangler]

8. They got diverted a long way from their home base

so I think the "poor weather and air traffic delays at Lakenheath" must have been pretty serious. From their Lakenheath base to the training area at Otterburn is about 200 miles (going north); Bedford, where the near miss happened, is nearly all the way back to Lakenheath - also about 200 miles from Otterburn, and about 50 from Lakenheath; and Anglesey, where they eventually landed, is 200 miles west. So if the weather was so bad that they had decided to divert them all the way to Anglesey (there are plenty of military bases closer than that, so it's surprising they did send them that far) I can see they might want to conserve fuel. But it sounds as if there were screwups along the way.

[patcox2]

9. I've been in a plane buzzed much closer than that by fighters.

US fighter pilots are cowboys (the italian gondola incident should be proof enough of that). I have been in a US commercial flight and saw a US fighter jet come within 100 feet, I saw the pilots face, and it came on from straight ahead, went by like a bullet, I was shocked.