Aerial film captures the terrifying moment a single-engine Cessna narrowly avoided colliding with a Delta Boeing 757 passenger flight above Orlando International Airport. The collision between the two aircraft may have resulted in several fatalities.
Last month, as traffic backed up ahead of the busy Labor Day weekend, a near miss occurred when the much smaller Cessna flew within approximately 500 feet of the crowded jumbo plane that was departing from Orlando International.
The video, shot from inside the Cessna, demonstrates the hero pilot’s commendable response to the emergency. He took immediate, evasive action by rising above the quickly ascending aircraft, narrowly averting a collision by a few feet.
In a recent interview with ABC News, the pilot, Malik Clarke, described the terrifying encounter, describing how he had to take “evasive action” to escape the much bigger, crowded jet. The FAA is presently looking into the incident.
When asked about the near-miss, Clarke told the television station, “I knew that this didn’t seem right.” He recalled seeing the jet fast climbing toward his aircraft on August 17.
The Boeing 757 from Delta has a lot greater climb rate than the aircraft that I was flying, so I turned right and ascended as sharply as I could straight away, Clarke said.
By a margin of barely 500 feet, Clarke’s fast thinking seems to have saved both aircraft from colliding, which very certainly would have been catastrophic for all of the engaged pilots as well as the passengers.
According to Clarke, if he hadn’t made that evasive move, there probably would have been a midair crash.
According to Clarke, as the Delta jet flew just below his plane, he had just switched frequencies and was out of communication with air traffic control, which increased the strain on the pilot since both planes’ safety depended heavily on him.
transcript of pilots’ letters to air traffic control after a close call over Orlando
Runway 36L is open for takeoff, says the tower. contact number 54 kilo, leave.”
“Going to departure,” said the Cessna’s pilot, “54 kilo.”
“N5254K, Orlando approach,” said the tower. “What direction were they giving you?”
Pilot of a Cessna: “090 We saw it.” We only flew 150 since we could see the man approaching, but they granted us 090 up to 2000.
We have that traffic that just passed straight over us, the Delta pilot said to the tower.
The FAA released a transcript of the communication during its continuing investigation into why the planes were flying closer than recommended, claiming that the pilots of each aircraft claimed to have seen the other.
Steve Ganyard, a former State Department employee who now contributes to ABC News, is convinced that someone was to blame for the near encounter, although he did not say whether it was Clarke or the 757’s unnamed pilots.
According to Ganyard, “The two planes went as near as 500 feet vertically and 1500 feet horizontally, which is considerably too close.”
Someone made a mistake by placing them in the same area of the sky.
In the meanwhile, Delta said that “nothing is more essential than safety” and that it is also launching its own internal inquiry into the near-miss.
While the FAA inquiry is still underway, the organisation that represents air traffic control, the National Air Traffic Controllers Association, has declined to comment in accordance with agency protocol.
On the other hand, Orlando International Airport has not yet made a statement on the event.
The video was captured only a few days after violent winds at another Florida airport turned over a tiny single-passenger aircraft, killing one person and wounding another.
At about 5 p.m. on Thursday at Orlando Executive Airport, the twin-engine Diamond DA42 Twin Star flipped over while it waited to take off as a result of gusts of up to 40 mph, according to the FAA on Friday.
When emergency personnel got on the site, one victim had already passed away, according to an Orlando Fire Department official.
To the Orlando Regional Medical Center was sent a second passenger. Their status is now unclear, and neither victim was immediately named.
Both incidences occur at a time when airlines are still struggling with staffing and schedule difficulties brought on by the pandemic, the present state of the economy, and a competitive labour market. Pilots are picketing at 14 major airports around the US.
The union said last week that pilots from Delta Air Lines, Endeavor Air, JetBlue, Sun Country, Spirit Airlines, and United Airlines are all taking part.
Despite the busy holiday weekend, which saw around 13 million Americans fly across the nation to ring in the end of summer, those airlines have emphasised that those pilots are off-duty and that demonstrations would not result in delays or cancellations.
The FAA is looking into both instances right now.