Flight Level Near Midair
11-01-2007 | 06:54 AM
#21
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From: Nordskog Industries Field Technician
RVSM's all over the world now boys, get used to it. There is one very popular airway that runs down the western side of Iran where you will see 1000' traffic above and below every couple of minutes, depending on the time of day.
Speaking to the accuracy of the FMS/GPS: We will often get a "one-thousand" call from the GPWS when passing opposite direction traffic 1000' feet below.
For those of you who aren't down with the whole beak-to-beak thing, SLOP is an accepted practice now. Strategic Lateral Offset Procedure, look it up.
Anyhow, back to the thread. Is there a report about that event, or anything to substantiate it besides word-of-mouth? The reason I ask is that not following an RA is a pretty big deal.
Speaking to the accuracy of the FMS/GPS: We will often get a "one-thousand" call from the GPWS when passing opposite direction traffic 1000' feet below.
For those of you who aren't down with the whole beak-to-beak thing, SLOP is an accepted practice now. Strategic Lateral Offset Procedure, look it up.
Anyhow, back to the thread. Is there a report about that event, or anything to substantiate it besides word-of-mouth? The reason I ask is that not following an RA is a pretty big deal.
11-01-2007 | 06:59 AM
#22
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That's no joke. Came head-to-head with another 121 RJ the other day...we were the 1000 ft separation, but that sure scared the pants off me. No traffic call from Center either.
Even at the 1000 ft separation I thought we were goners - at that altitude, your eyes can deceive - and at 1000 kts closure I had 1 second after I saw them and they were right on top of us...
Even at the 1000 ft separation I thought we were goners - at that altitude, your eyes can deceive - and at 1000 kts closure I had 1 second after I saw them and they were right on top of us...
Why on earth would that scare you? That's normal procedure for RVSM operations. You had better get used to it, or you'll have a heart attack pretty soon!
11-01-2007 | 11:21 AM
#25
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Please keep in mind guys that everything these systems function off of are the transponder, which is dependant on the altimeter sending the correct figures to the Xponder. That is why it is absolutely imperitive that you cross check your xponder to altimeter readings frequently for the xponder selected and in use.
11-01-2007 | 06:09 PM
#26
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From: A320 CA
No, you need each aircraft to be equipped with TCAS II to get an RA, in all other cases, only a TA will be issued (the box cannot tell you which way to go unless it knows where the other guy is going...and can you imagine the lawsuit if TCAS told an aircraft to climb into the path of a non-TCAS Aircraft?).
11-01-2007 | 07:00 PM
#27
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From: CRJ
No, you need each aircraft to be equipped with TCAS II to get an RA, in all other cases, only a TA will be issued (the box cannot tell you which way to go unless it knows where the other guy is going...and can you imagine the lawsuit if TCAS told an aircraft to climb into the path of a non-TCAS Aircraft?).
So to clarify so there is no confusion,
IF BOTH planes have TCAS II then they BOTH get Complimentary RA'S
If one plane has TCAS II and the other only has a MODE C transponder with altitude encoding, then the TCAS II equipped plane will get a RA.
If one plane has TCAS II and the other only has a transponder with no altitude encoding, then all you will get is a TA ( The TCAS II system can not determine altitude of intruding aircraft, therefor it can not tell you to climb or descend).
11-01-2007 | 07:29 PM
#28
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From: Engines Turn or People Swim
The center in question didn't want any unnecessary publicity on this (obviously). The CA of the PAX aircraft requested some hard copy, and was told that they would not voluntarily release the info, he would have to file a Freedom of Information Act request. Since he was not at fault, he didn't have an automatic right to review evidence. Anyone else could do a FOIA also.
11-01-2007 | 07:43 PM
#29
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People,
I just heard (from a guy who was there) about a recent very near midair between an 121 pax airliner and a large 121 cargo plane (one of the big two). The story was very disturbing...
Center made an error assigning cargo an altitude, and both aircraft ended up head-to-head at cruise speed in the flight levels.
Center's computer alerter went off at the same time as the RA's...not much time here, about 1000 knots closure, like top gun. Center starts screaming (very agitated since the seperation violation has already occured) that he told cargo a different altitude and to climb immediately....
Pax gets a climb RA, cargo gets a descend RA...good so far, but the controller's insistent screaming somehow convinces cargo to ignore the RA and climb instead
The aircraft came with a couple hundred feet and pax saved the day by executing a hard banked turn (in the 300 flight levels).
It was determined that the controller assigned cargo the wrong altitude, but cargo still should have followed the RA. I find this pretty distrurbing because a professional flight crew at one of the worlds top aviation employers disregarded an RA in extremis.
This is almost the exact same scenario that brought down that Russian airliner (and a DHL heavy) over germany a few years back. Please remember these two events next time you get an RA...I sure will.
I just heard (from a guy who was there) about a recent very near midair between an 121 pax airliner and a large 121 cargo plane (one of the big two). The story was very disturbing...
Center made an error assigning cargo an altitude, and both aircraft ended up head-to-head at cruise speed in the flight levels.
Center's computer alerter went off at the same time as the RA's...not much time here, about 1000 knots closure, like top gun. Center starts screaming (very agitated since the seperation violation has already occured) that he told cargo a different altitude and to climb immediately....
Pax gets a climb RA, cargo gets a descend RA...good so far, but the controller's insistent screaming somehow convinces cargo to ignore the RA and climb instead
The aircraft came with a couple hundred feet and pax saved the day by executing a hard banked turn (in the 300 flight levels).
It was determined that the controller assigned cargo the wrong altitude, but cargo still should have followed the RA. I find this pretty distrurbing because a professional flight crew at one of the worlds top aviation employers disregarded an RA in extremis.
This is almost the exact same scenario that brought down that Russian airliner (and a DHL heavy) over germany a few years back. Please remember these two events next time you get an RA...I sure will.
The cargo a/c had an emergency of some sort and was going over us on the arrival as we were headed west. There was weather in the area that we needed to deviate for. The controller kept telling us we couldnt' get higher because of the emergency going over top of us which was fine with us, we couldnt' climb much more anyway. We finally were able to convince center we needed to go right for the weather which they gave us.
About 10 seconds later we got the TA (Traffic Advisory), the preliminary status letting us know a conflict could occur if nothing changes. We noticed he was at the same altitude and I was able to pick him out between two buildups, as soon as we got the visual on him we got the RA (Resolution Advisory) telling us to climb. We started to climb and as we were climbing I informed ATC what we were doing but they blocked us telling the other a/c to get back on altitude. His RA was telling him to descend (heard on the tapes) but that's when I noticed that he was climbing too. We started a left turn to avoid him. It was close, but none of the pax or the fa noticed a thing. Once the other guy realized what was going on he did descend per his RA.
The only thing I would say is that, I had some close calls when I was flight instructing, like a T-6 coming over the top and dropping in front of you, but this was different. We are all professional pilots who NEED to do what we're trained to do. I won't ever say I can't understand why the other guy climbed, with ATC yelling at him, I understand the temptation. But please please chalk this up as a learning experience for everyone. You must follow the RA, MUST.
If the other a/c had followed the RA there would have been no issues, other than a loss of seperation, but by ignoring it, there were 55-60 people's lives put in jeopardy. Like I said, I will never fault the other guy for this, I'm just happy that we acted in a manner that kept us all safe.
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