Near miss! Passenger plane flies into RAF 'war games'

Stock photo: PA

A Flybe passenger plane coming into land at the Western Isles main airport in Scotland got caught up in war games involving 14 military aircraft.

An investigation into the "needless incident" blasted the RAF, saying the exercise should have been stopped as soon as it became clear the plane was about to land.

According to the Scotsman, the RAF Tornadoes were simulating an attack on the Stornoway Airport, and were told there were no passenger planes expected to arrive.

The incident is being investigated by the Airprox Board, which said the Flybe Saab pilot commented: "Those Tornados just got a wee bit too close."

A report said: "At 1,100ft on the approach, they saw two grey Tornado aircraft straight ahead and coming towards them.

"A few seconds later they had a Traffic Alert and Collision Avoidance System (TCAS) climb command, quickly followed by a monitor vertical speed command.

"The Tornado was then seen to pull up and away from them aggressively but they informed ATC they were going around due to the TCAS commands.

"They climbed to 2,000ft and... then saw two black Hawk aircraft underneath them also manoeuvring aggressively so they advised ATC of the other aircraft. ATC was not aware that they were there.

"The military aircraft knew the passenger plane had gone around... but still continued to attack their target - one Tornado acknowledged the fact that they had to go around.

"Scottish ATC informed the passenger plane that there were a total of 14 military aircraft close to them at the time of the incident.

"He [the pilot] assessed the risk of collision as being high and reported the incident to the Stornoway approach controller."

The board said: "Members agreed that since both Tornados had been visual with the Saab, and its pilot saw [both] the Tornados, albeit at a slightly later stage, there had been no risk of collision.

"Having said that, it was agreed unanimously that this had been a needless incident that could have been prevented initially by better planning and communication.

"Accepting these deficiencies, the incident could have been stopped in the air had either the Tornado crew aborted the attack or the approach controller refused the Tornados permission to conduct it as soon as the potential conflict with the airliner became apparent."

According to the Daily Mail, the Tornado formation leader was criticised as "disappointing" for choosing to "continue the simulated attack... despite having been informed that there was traffic on approach to the airfield".

Loganair, which operated the flight for Flybe, has since said improvements to communications about military and civilian flights had been agreed at a follow-up meeting with the RAF.


Sign up to our weekly newsletterFollow us on TwitterBecome a fan on Facebook