Pilot halts Hollywood Burbank Airport landing in latest close-call incident
According to preliminary information from the FAA, an air traffic controller had released a SkyWest Airlines Embraer E175 to take off from runway 33 on Wednesday at around 6:55 p.m. local time in the most recent near miss. At the same time, a Mesa Bombardier CRJ900 was preparing to land about 1.3 miles from the runway, the FAA said.
The pilot of the Mesa flight aborted the landing and climbed up. The SkyWest plane continued its departure, resulting in an automatic alarm sounding on the Mesa plane’s flight deck. The air traffic controller then instructed the crew of the Mesa flight to fly on a course away from the other planes.
The National Transportation Safety Board said Friday it had launched an investigation into the incident.
NTSB is investigating runway incursion February 22 at Bob Hope Burbank Airport that occurred when a Skywest Embraer 175 exited runway 33 when a Mesa Airlines CRJ9 was performing a pilot-initiated go-around while inbound to land on the same runway. No damage or injuries reported.
— NTSB Newsroom (@NTSB_Newsroom) February 24, 2023
The incident at the airport about 15 miles north of downtown Los Angeles follows several others that have occurred in recent months.
On February 4, air traffic controllers cleared a FedEx cargo plane to land on the same runway that a Southwest Airlines jet took off from. The planes came within 100 feet of each other.
On Jan. 13, an incident at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport involving an American Airlines jet and a Delta Air Lines flight brought the planes about 1,400 feet apart. The Delta flight had accelerated to about 115 mph before halting its attempt to take off after a dire warning from air traffic controllers, the NTSB said.
At Daniel K. Inouye International Airport in Honolulu on January 23, a United Airlines plane was crossing a runway as a small Cessna landed.
During an incident in December at a Maui airport, a United Airlines flight bound for San Francisco dived 1,400 feet toward the Pacific Ocean shortly after takeoff, according to flight tracking data, in another incident that sparked a federal investigation.
The spate of incidents prompted Acting FAA Administrator Billy Nolen to call an industry-wide safety summit in recent days. Nolen, who appeared before a Senate panel investigating safety incidents — including the failure of a key FAA pilot information system — sought to reassure members of the Trade, Science and Transportation Committees that the national airspace system is safe. Still, according to Nolen, security is “something we don’t take for granted.”
Concerns about the FAA’s ability to keep national airspace safe come as the agency has been without permanent leadership for about a year. Some Republicans have expressed concerns about Biden’s nominee for the post, Philip A. Washington, arguing that he does not have enough aviation experience. Washington was named chief executive of Denver International Airport in 2021 but has spent much of his career in transit.
A hearing before the Trade, Science and Transportation Committee on Washington’s nomination is scheduled for Wednesday.
The agency has made preventing incidents known as “runway incursions” a longstanding priority, but recent incidents have raised questions about the effectiveness of the FAA’s efforts. According to the agency, some airports have reported dozens of runway incursions over the past 10 to 15 years. Last year, the FAA recorded 1,732 such assaults, although they vary widely in severity.
The NTSB on Thursday released a preliminary report on the Honolulu incident, which found the two planes came within 1,173 feet of each other. There were no injuries and no damage was sustained by either aircraft.