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Tragedy averted: Day of near misses
Two major disasters were averted when a Jet Airplane narrowly missed colliding with air force jets, report Rahul Singh and Haresh Pandya.
Two major disasters were averted on Thursday when a Jet Airways' Boeing narrowly missed colliding with a formation of air force jets over Rajkot while an Indian flight aborted a landing in New Delhi after its pilot saw another plane on the runway.
First, the Jet-Sukhoi near-miss. Rajkot came dangerously close to what could have been the worst mishap over its skies.
At about 8.30 am, a Jet Airways Boeing 707 400 carrying 89 passengers from Mumbai had a providential escape after it came within a whisker of a mid-air collision with a Sukhoi-30 fighter of the Indian Air Force (IAF).
Two Su-30s were practicing combat maneouvers over the Rajkot skies as part of exercise Gagan Shakti, which commenced on September 4 and will last through September 24, when the Jet aircraft apparently found itself at the same height. Had the tragedy not been averted at the last moment, it would have caused major embarrassment to the IAF and also accounted for its first ever Sukhoi crash.
Ironically, the IAF had plans to fly a media contingent to Jamnagar on Friday to mark the successful culmination of the exercise. That, of course, stands cancelled and the IAF has marked an inquiry into the incident along with the DGCA.
Preferring to tone down the incident, an IAF spokesperson said that prima facie reports suggested that the fighter aircraft posed no threat to the civil airliner, as they were “visual” and under the control of the ground-based radar.
The Sukhois belonged to the No.30 Squadron based in Pune. The IAF has fielded every aircraft type in its combat fleet for the exercise involving the Western Air Command and South Western Air Command, with their reach stretching out from Kashmir to Goa. IAF pilots usually do not violate a “bubble” of 300 metres provided “we are visual.”
An IAF source said, “The Jet pilot may be saying it was a near-miss but the fact is that visual contact can be deceptive sometimes. What one might consider accurate may be actually off the mark by 2,000 feet. “ IAF sources attributed the goof-up to the Ahmedabad Area Control and Rajkot Air Traffic Control, which gave the civilian pilot “descent early” clearance knowing that a combat exercise was on.
“The Sukhoi pilots were well aware of the Jet aircraft when it was more than 50 kms away, as the radars had picked it up. So the question of a collision does not arise. The Jet pilot became jittery as he was not on a different frequency and clueless. This whole thing is quite funny,” the sources said.
Jet Airways CEO Wolfgang Prock-Schauer said, "The aircraft made a normal approachat Rajkoot as prescribed by the ATC. But the TCAS (traffic collision avoidance system) of the aircraft alerted the captain to immediately react and change course." Meanwhile, the Boeing has been grounded and its return flight to Mumbai cancelled. “The Boeing developed a technical snag,” was all B. Sawant, in-charge station manager, Rajkot Airport, would say.
But it is learnt that the aircraft developed a problem after the pilot increased engine thrust to faciliate a quick ascent to avoid the IAF fighters.
The Jet flight 9W-345 had descended to 22,500 feet, and came within 500 feet of the Su-30s, when it was asked by the air traffic control to pull up to 23,000 feet. “We heard a blast in the air but no one told us what really happened,” said Kirit Ghelani,a Mumbai-bound traveller.
About 12 hours later, the Indian flight IC-168 from Mumbai was set to land in Delhi's Indira Gandhi airport at about eight pm when its pilot suddenly saw another aeroplane on the runway assigned to it.
After announcing that another aircraft was on the runway, the pilot made a sharp climb that "shocked" passengers, a senior government official who was on the flight told PTI.
The official, however, complimented the pilot's quick reflexes which she felt had saved the lives of about 150 passengers in the "packed flight".
