United And Alaska Airlines Aborted Landing In San Francisco To Avoid Hitting Southwest Airlines Jet

I guess the controller issued a "cleared for takeoff" instruction which was blocked. It's unsafe to takeoff because you *think* you heard a clearance somewhere in a garbled, stepped-on call. It seems to me that the SW pilot did absolutely everything correctly. And so did the other pilots. The only party not keeping up was the controller. She was reacting too slowly, other pilot called go around before the controller did, she should have realized it wasn't going to work and called for the missed approach before the pilots had to.

Communications between a/c and tower. Credit VASAviation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E4cewwhcL5c

This might be the third incident I’ve read about the same controller at SFO, a major attitude problem that needs to be corrected immediately. There’s no ego in aviation.

“Other than the Southwest pilot, who didn’t follow (and may not have internalized) instructions, everyone did everything right. But like many reason near-misses, the margin for safety was limited.”

What instruction didn’t SW follow? He was cleared to cross and line up and that’s what he did.
Though, I think in the same situation looking right into the landing lights of that heavy, I would have passed on that opportunity and take an extra minute for the family. But then I’m never in a rush unlike some others ;) Just take it easy people. Stress is unhealthy.

For goodness sake, isn't it time that aviation moved on from 1950's voice communications radio technology?

Sorry but the fault was from the controller, it’s no way the pilot will take off without his permission. I agreed with donor then. He or she should get fired.

The system worked. ATC is a collaborative effort between the pilots and controllers. No one is perfect and no communication is perfect, voice or data link. We listen to each, confirm by repeating what we're told, and question when things don't make sense, for our own aircraft or another.

During the Reagan era, there was a "zero tolerance" policy that forced pilots and controllers to shut up and not question mistakes because someone would be punished for a human error. That created an environment where errors were allowed to go unquestioned.

Data link is great but requires you to either have a second pilot to handles comms or take your eye away from the window or nav. And data link entries are just as error prone as voice.

Yes, two plane went around. We're trained for that. The default for every landing is a go around. Only if everything is fine, do you complete the landing. Just because we complete the landings most of the time, doesn't mean we shouldn't be ready for the inevitable. If you've taken an ATP checkride, probably on some landing, just before or as your wheels touchdown, the examiner quietly says "truck on the runway" and you better be ready to goose the throttles and be on the go.

I like stories like this one. Reminds us of what we need to do and shows that human redundancy in the system works.

The frequency of these types of incidents is increasing. Anyone who has a background in statistics will tell you that unless the trend is interrupted by action, an accident is only a matter of time.

this incompetence is entirely on the tower, the FAA and other air traffic control entities.

for those of you using the term"czar",referencing the need for one to run/control the FAA,and also as a derogatory remark regarding some political figures,the term is derived from a russian word "tsar",meaing "king" or "monarch"..we need a competent PERSON who knows aviation well,who might just have a pilots license or have been a commercial pilot,and someone who can influence the hiring of responsible,competent people to staff the ATC towers at airports of all sizes..we are NOT in need of a monarch or king..we have enough people in politics who feel they have that title!these recent near misses etcetera,appear to be a lack of total communication /directions/instructions between various ATC personnel and the pilots involved..

Controller obviously at fault for not confirming readback, then tries to blame pilot "on frequency". THEN, has the gall to say "let's not argue on frequency" when the pilot merely informed her of his last clearance.

Controller was at fault. She lost control of the air traffic she was managing and the pilots had to takeover to see and avoid. Plain and simple. Retrain the controller for having a nasty attitude when she failed to keep aircraft separated.

Sounds like the controller was having a bad day. She should have stayed home and not brought her attitude to work. If that's her regular attitude, she should not be in the high-stress position of controller of any kind. Controllers must ALWAYS be very professional, which all pilots involved were. Her snap-back to the pilot was inappropriate. Likely she felt threatened because she knew it was her mistake.

The controller gets feedback from the pilot not only on the radio, but also from looking out the tower window to the runway. There's a reason the tower has very large windows and sits just off the runway. When the plane did not do what she had cleared it to do, she should have repeated the instruction, figuring her call was stepped on. If she needed him to expedite the taxi, she should have included that in the clearance.

we don't know all the details but I hope these incidents are not the result of the loss of meritocracy in this country..

Looking around to see where the list's courtesy and mutual respect standard seems to have flown off to…

Yikes. What happened to "no delay"? On a clear night, how could SWA not get the picture?

SWA In Austin took his sweet time to roll so FedEx could land.

What the Hell

Pro tip: DO NOT FLY WITH SOUTHWEST FOR THE NEXT 6 MONTHS

Other than the Southwest pilot, who didn’t follow (and may not have internalized) instructions, everyone did everything right. But like many reason near-misses, the margin for safety was limited.

What instruction didn’t SW follow? He was cleared to cross and line up and that’s what he did. I think in the same situation looking right into the landing lights of that heavy, I would have passed on that opportunity and take an extra minute for the family. But then I’m never in a rush like some others. Just take it easy people. Stress in unhealthy. :)

You left out Alaska short final for 28R ... "Hold short" NOT "line up and wait..."

SW slow rolled a take off at Austin, jammed FedEx widebody
Into Go Around...

Anyone wonder why the United flight was at 225 feet AGL a mile from the runway> Probably wasn't but the reporter obviously got it wrong as usual..

Anyone wonder why the United flight was at 225 feet AGL a mile from the runway>

This definitely controller error

KSFO is the worst airport I've flown to. KIAD and KLAX are both fabulous and professional as are most airports around the country.

The voice over radio has lots of crackling noise.. Why is so much noise at such a short distance from each other..?

It would appear that the sky's are becoming way to congested around larger airports which creates a very unsafe environment. It is only a small matter of time before the next disaster.

The system is too antiquated. Clearances should be texted, with vox coms used just as a backup or for urgent messages.

Aviation gentlemen and ladies. I disagree with some of the comments of blame and firing. The controller issues a clearance to SW1179 to cross RWY 28L and line up and wait on 28R. SW1179 acknowledges the clearance and starts to cross 28L. The crossing is very slow. UAL277 is cleared to land on RWY 28L. UAL277 declares the go around 30 seconds after SW1179 has been issued the cross RWY 28L clearance. The takeoff clearance for SW1179 has not been issued yet. Hence, the go around of UAL277 has nothing to do with the takeoff clearance being received or not received. Although there is no fault on the SW1179 pilot being slow, in a busy airport like SFO, taking 1:27 seconds to cross RWY 28L and linen up on RWY 28R is a long time.
Furthermore, the pilot says "we never got that clearance, somebody blocked it" and then in a later transmission "The last clearance we got was for a line-up and wait" which is unnecessary and crowding a frequency that is extremely busy.
If landing and taking off is happening every 90 seconds like in this airport, there will be times when aircraft are going to go around due to runway occupancy.

The comments ignore that there are intersecting runways at SFO, and they land inbound across the Bay and depart on the other runway to the north. United was inbound over the Bay with a landing clearance from the Tower controller.
Meantime, Southwest got a prior taxi clearance from Ground frequency to taxi to the active and the
"Line up and wait" was a modification of the prior clearance.
Understand, there are two frequencies here -- Tower and Ground. Southwest is listening to Ground, not Tower. Southwest would change to Tower once off the taxiway and onto the active departure runway.
This was a controller error, but media made it sound like a Southwest pilot error.

While the administration has been hammering airlines over nonsensical issues ( see SOTU address), the FAA is ignored

I have no need to travel by air @ the present time. But if I did; I’d give it second thoughts considering the sad state of air travel, air traffic control, & the type of ATC candidates being hired w/in the US & strongly consider driving.