Near Miss, no so say CAA

seaviewuk · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:00

Officials have denied any breach of safety after two planes were pictures apparently flying perilously close together over east London.
The aircraft - a DHL plane and a Japan Airlines jet - were reportedly seen flying over West Ham's Upton Park ground just after 1500 GMT on Saturday.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4660644.stm

Looks damn close to me!

gib786 · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:01

that looks v v v damn close to me

Glaucus · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:05

dpends on the size of the two planes. They could be several hundred feet apart..

Jotun · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:05

Whilst they look close, i think the article is probabaly correct, it's all down to perspective.

asim · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:06

I think i'd panic jus a little bit if I saw another plane outside my window.

Werewolf · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:08

I would say it's probably perspective, as there is no third object of a known size it makes it very hard to judge distances, just look at the pics of the pentagon after 911 for a great example of the tricks the eye/camera can play.

Flibster · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:09

Thats not a near miss - thats a near hit!
A collision is a near miss!

It's probably all down to perspective though. Probably a good few hundred feet apart.

Simon/~Flibster

Psyk · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:12

If someone could tell what sort of plane's they were then you could know the size and make a rough guess of how far apart they are.

NickXX · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:15

Psyk said:
If someone could tell what sort of plane's they were then you could know the size and make a rough guess of how far apart they are.

Was thinking the same thing. If we knew what planes they were, we could use their lengths to work out the distance between them.

SiHH · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:18

Werewolf said:
just look at the pics of the pentagon after 911 for a great example of the tricks the eye/camera can play.

OT but I havnt seen a single picture of plane wreckage near the Pentagon from 9/11...

Dodgy dodgy dodgy.

-Neil- · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:24

Psyk said:
If someone could tell what sort of plane's they were then you could know the size and make a rough guess of how far apart they are.

The JAL aircraft is a 777-300 (possibly 200ER, but I'd say 300 due to the raked wingtip) and the DHL is an A300.

Try this for perspective

http://www.airliners.net/open.file/652327/L/

Neil.

clv101 · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:27

Whoo, that's close. "...a good few hundred feet apart" is very very close, far too close when doing 400mph in a jet (just think about reaction times and turbulence at those speeds, 200 feet takes 0.34sec at 400mph). I don't even think working out from perspective would show them to be that far apart since they are obviously similar sized and the one with the smaller features is the closer one.

Yas786 · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:29

Hmmm not only is it down to perspective but also according to the bbc reports, there were no alarm bells that were set off as both planes would inevitably have some sort of collision detector on board.

Saying that...it looks very close indeed.

NickM · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:30

Its all perspective. They do it at airshows all the time (make planes look like there are about to crash when they are really quite far apart)

BBC said:
The spokesman said there was no question that either aircraft had strayed from its proper path, which should mean there was a distance of some two and a half miles between them.

clv101 · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:32

"...two and a half miles between them." Yeah right!

Malt_Vinegar · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:34

Different flight levels.
So its not an issue iirc

Memphis · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:40

Looks close. Might be. Might not be. Unless anyone from the flight crew of either plane posts here, we can only speculate.

inferno · 29 Jan 2006 at 21:41

Yeah, it's all about the flight levels

If they were too close their TCAS would have been 'screaming'

Malt_Vinegar · 29 Jan 2006 at 22:05

Memphis said:
Looks close. Might be. Might not be. Unless anyone from the flight crew of either plane posts here, we can only speculate.

I think you will find ATC would have a pretty good idea, i would be very worried if they didnt know what the separation was!

As said before, air to air colisions between large airlines are unlikely due to TCAS systems. (Although not unheard of)

NicktheNorse · 29 Jan 2006 at 22:06

If in pattern waiting to land they were 1,000 feet apart (different holding flight levels). This supposed "near-miss" happens literally every second across the world.

Even the bbc has started over dramatizing stuff now, utter rubbish!