What happened on September 11th at Marseille airport with an Air Algérie plane? The Bureau of Investigations and Analysis (BEA), the official French civil aviation body, has opened an investigation.
The tragedy was narrowly avoided. On September 11, a Boeing of the airline Air Algeria approaches Marseille-Provence airport. He is cleared to land but a controller quickly orders him to regain altitude. Here are the facts.
Air Algérie: two planes authorized on the same runway at Marseille airport
The incident occurred on the Chlef – Marseille flight. The flight was taking place at night and the Air Algérie Boeing 737, registered 7T-VKL, was cleared to land on runway 31R at Marseille airport. The crew began their approach.
But at the same time, another plane, a Boeing 757 from the Spanish airline Gestair, was present on the same runway in preparation for takeoff, the BEA emphasizes. The latter had previously been authorized to line up on the runway in preparation for takeoff, adds the French organization. The controller therefore asked the crew of the Air Algérie flight to interrupt the approach, continues the same source.
Human error
These types of incidents are rare. They often result from human errors committed by air traffic controllers. But they can have very serious consequences for the two planes involved. Fortunately, for the passengers and crew of the two Air Algérie and Gestair planes, the air traffic controller at Marseille airport quickly corrected his error, avoiding a disaster.
” Indeed, it was a controller error. The plane had to abort the approach and go around to start a new approach. “, a source close to Air Algérie confirmed to us, specifying that at no time were the passengers or the plane in danger.
For its part, the BEA, which qualified the incident as ” fall ” announced the opening of an investigation into the incident. The findings are expected to be made public shortly.
According to Flight Radar data, the flight, which took off on time from Chlef airport, was delayed by 21 minutes. This is probably the time taken by the crew to complete a runway circuit after the landing was aborted.