Wrong Track

By Ed Magnuson

The fact that airline crews were overheard arguing by radio about whether they could avoid reporting a near collision over the North Atlantic last July 8 was alarming enough. But last week the National Transportation Safety Board reported that the two airliners, a Delta L-1011 and a Continental 747, carrying a total of nearly 600 people, had missed each other by a hair-raising margin of about 30 ft. Worse yet, investigators in both Canada and the U.S. suggested a probable reason for the Delta crew to want to keep the close call a secret. An interim NTSB report charged that the Delta crew had failed to follow basic procedures for double-checking the plane's location. It was 60 miles off course.

In transatlantic crossings, where planes cannot be monitored by ground-based radar, airliners are assigned parallel tracks that can be at the same altitude but are 60 miles apart. To make sure they are on course, crews are expected to log their position at waypoints based on latitude and longitude and to report it by radio to air controllers. At best, this could alert the monitoring stations to any developing danger, and the controllers could suggest changes in course, altitude or speed.

In this case, both of the jumbo jets were flying toward the U.S. from London at 31,000 ft. and were reporting to the Canadian air-traffic center at Gander, Newfoundland. Their close call came in clear weather at about the halfway point in their crossing. The Delta airliner drifted south of its course and passed just under the Continental plane, which was on its proper track. According to the NTSB, which is cooperating in the investigation with the Canadian Aviation Safety Board, the Delta crew had not been supplied with oceanic charts to display the coordinates of their assigned flight path. As a result, the crew "did not plot their present or predicted positions upon crossing waypoints."

The U.S. board urged the Federal Aviation Administration to issue new rules requiring that crews apply at least five of six recommended techniques for verifying their location, including use of the charts. The Delta crew, the investigators found, had followed only one of the six procedures. The Canadian board issued a similar plea and reported that five times a month aircraft crossing the North Atlantic stray off course by 25 miles or more. These "gross deviations," the Canadian board said, are occurring "with sufficient frequency for concern." The American board faulted both crews for failing to report the incident promptly, which left air controllers unaware that the Delta plane was off course. Delta suspended the pilot for a year, the co-pilot for three months and the flight engineer for two months. Continental took no action against its crew.

Another apparent example of sloppy procedures nearly led to the death of an Eastern Express pilot last week. Pilot Henry Dempsey and Co-Pilot Paul Boucher took off in a Beechcraft 99 commuter plane from Portland, Me., without any passengers -- and seemingly without the rear door securely fastened. When Dempsey went back to close it, the plane ran into turbulence, and he was tossed against the door. Hinged at the bottom, it swung down, and Dempsey fell forward with it. He clung to the door, head down, with only his legs inside the aircraft.

At the controls, Boucher assumed that the pilot had dropped into the Atlantic and asked for a Coast Guard search. But when he made an emergency landing at Portland International Jetport, Boucher discovered happily that Dempsey was still hanging on to the door. His head had missed striking the ground by 12 inches. He suffered only a bruised wrist.

Meanwhile Transportation Secretary Elizabeth Dole announced that the FAA will require the 14 largest air carriers to report how often each flight is more than 15 minutes late for any cause except a mechanical problem. The flights will then be assigned a code that will show up on the computers of ticket and travel agents; travelers who ask will be given some idea of the reliability of the schedule for each flight. Similar reports will be required on the frequency of lost, delayed, damaged or pilfered baggage.

With reporting by Jerry Hannifin/Washington and Peter Stoler/Ottawa