Airmiss!

[LisuLover]

Last Wednesday lunchtime, I left Bkk onboard BR67 and had just about survived the pain of 12 hours in a rock hard aircraft seat, only to have my EVA 777 almost 'arse-ended' at 10,000ft, by a Thai Airways 747, while we were both doing loop the loop for 40 minutes waiting to land at rush hour Heathrow. You can imagine my surprise to see the big jumbo looming at the rear of our starboard wing and filling my window. It may have been 300 or 400 metres away, hard to tell, but surely an 'air miss'. I looked round my cabin and mine was the only window open, but someone in another cabin must have seen it. Should I report it? Been too busy until now.

[theblether]

Yes report it.

They do say that air distance makes objects look closer than they really are but if you are sure about what you saw make a complaint and see what happens.

[tolsti]

ATC will have already reported this if it did happen. LHR arrivals are very strictly controlled. It is, as the blether says, very diffident even for experienced persons to accurately gage distance and separation with very few visual references available.

http://planefinder.net/about/radar-separation-in-air-traffic/

[khaosai]

Hi,

large aircraft in the holding pattern do look quite close on occasion with the required separation being a minimum of 1000 feet vertically. Do you think the other aircraft was at the same level ? Where you aware of any pitch and thrust change when you witnessed the other aircraft ?

The traffic collision avoidance manoeuvre should be flown smoothly and to be honest most passengers would not be aware of it happening.

The controlling at Heathrow is amongst the best in the world but both pilots and controllers make mistakes from time to time.

There is no harm in you reporting it, but I can assure you air traffic control and both airlines involved will have filled reports if it did occur.

[lomatopo]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z88X54G4Bjs

LHR "Stacks" http://www.heathrowairport.com/static/Heathrow_Noise/Downloads/PDF/Stacks11.pdf

[tw25rw]

I had something similar over London once.. Was in a holding pattern in cloud over Essex. Came out of the cloud over East London and there was a US Airways 767 side by side with us. Wingtips were less than 100m apart. He banked away as soon as he saw us. Also once saw 2 737s one above the other flying over Bromley about 3 plane lengths apart.

[Torrens54]

Lucky to have escaped having a "Big Burner Up Your Butt" Eh? Now try your luck with a Lotto ticket.

[Maybole]

You probably saw an illusion. Although you were looking at right angles to the aircraft's vertical plane, the aircraft, in a turn can be banked at up to 25 deg. to the actual vertical and your line of sight is also tilted. The other aircraft was probably well above or below you. Furthermore in the London TMA Transponder use is mandatory. A Transponder broadcasts amongst its data altitude information which displays on ATC Radar displays and any reduction of separation immediately sets off an alarm. Spurious alarms are common due to small variations in level keeping. Also each aircraft has a Collision Avoidance System which reads other aircraft transponders and alerts the flight crew to any danger.

RELAX

[Payboy]

Was the 747 flashing his lights vigorously in a Bkk style overtaking maneuver?

[Shaksey]

No loss of separation inc's noted on AVHerald for 31/7. Most likely explanations above!

[Lancashirelad]

If its been reported it will appear here when the site is updated:

http://www.caa.co.uk/application.aspx?catid=14&pagetype=65&appid=7&newstype=a