TAP A21N at Madrid on Sep 3rd 2023, descent below minimum safe altitude on approach, EGPWS saves the day

Last Update: October 11, 2023 / 18:02:40 GMT/Zulu time

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Incident Facts

Date of incident
Sep 3, 2023

Classification
Incident

Airline
TAP Air Portugal

Flight number
TP-1024

Departure
Lisbon, Portugal

Destination
Madrid, Spain

Aircraft Registration
CS-TXD

Aircraft Type
Airbus A321-Neo

ICAO Type Designator
A21N

A TAP Air Portugal Airbus A321-200N, registration CS-TXD performing flight TP-1024 from Lisbon (Portugal) to Madrid,SP (Spain) with 136 passengers and 7 crew, had been enroute when the first officer was feeling unwell and paid a number of visits to the lavatory to recover and returned to the cockpit. The aircraft was on approach to Madrid in poor weather conditions cleared for the ILS approach to runway 32L when the crew erroneously set the target altitude to 2000 feet. The aircraft descended at about 2500 fpm towards that target altitude when at a height of about 515 feet the EGPWS sounded "Terrain ahead! Pull Up!" prompting the crew to initiate a go around. The aircraft encountered turbulence during the go around, positioned for another approach and landed on runway 32L without further incident about 15 minutes after the go around.

Portugal's GPIAA stated, they did not open an investigation into the occurrence but stated: "Flight data from the event shows that at 14:08Z the aircraft descended to 515ft AGL (RALT) with a rate of 2500ft/min. The combination of the high rate of descent with the elevation of the terrain ahead activated the EGPWS system for 4 seconds." and subsequently stated: "Information was requested from the Madrid air traffic service provider to determine whether the Minimum Safe Altitude Warning (MSAW) system was in operation at the time of the event, and confirmation was received that the system was operational, although inhibited for the area of occurrence given the proximity to the airport (approach phase)."
Incident Facts

Date of incident
Sep 3, 2023

Classification
Incident

Airline
TAP Air Portugal

Flight number
TP-1024

Departure
Lisbon, Portugal

Destination
Madrid, Spain

Aircraft Registration
CS-TXD

Aircraft Type
Airbus A321-Neo

ICAO Type Designator
A21N

This article is published under license from Avherald.com. © of text by Avherald.com.
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