Vueling A320 and Vueling A320 at Barcelona on Jul 11th 2014, near collision

Last Update: May 28, 2019 / 19:25:17 GMT/Zulu time

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Photo of Vueling EC-IZD, Airbus A320 — Vueling EC-IZD, Airbus A320 (Photo credit: TrevorHannant / Flickr / License: CC by-sa)

Incident Facts

Date of incident
Jul 11, 2014

Classification
Incident

Cause
Near collision

Airline
Vueling

Flight number
VY-8305

Departure
Amsterdam, Netherlands

Destination
Barcelona, Spain

Aircraft Registration
EC-IZD

Aircraft Type
Airbus A320

ICAO Type Designator
A320

A Vueling Airbus A320-200, registration EC-IZD performing flight VY-8305 from Amsterdam (Netherlands) to Barcelona,SP (Spain) with 164 people on board, was on approach to Barcelona descending through 4000 feet about to intercept the localizer for runway 02.

A Vueling Airbus A320-200, registration EC-LZZ performing flight VY-6107 from Rome Fiumicino (Italy) to Barcelona,SP (Spain) with 153 people on board, was on approach to Barcelona descending through 4000 feet about to intercept the localizer for runway 02.

Spain's CIAIAC reported on Aug 4th 2014, that the separation between the aircraft reduced to 300 feet vertically and 1.1nm horizontally. Both aircraft performed evasive maneouvers, the conflict was resolved and both aircraft continued for safe landings. An investigation has been opened into the occurrence.

On Aug 5th 2014 the French BEA reported in their weekly bulletin that both aircraft received TCAS resolution advisories. Spain's CIAIAC rated the occurrence an incident and is investigating.

On May 28th 2019 Spain's CIAIAC released their final report in Spanish (Editorial note: to serve the purpose of global prevention of the repeat of causes leading to an occurrence an additional timely release of all occurrence reports in the only world spanning aviation language English would be necessary, a Spanish only release does not achieve this purpose as set by ICAO annex 13 and just forces many aviators to waste much more time and effort each in trying to understand the circumstances leading to the occurrence. Aviators operating internationally are required to read/speak English besides their local language, investigators need to be able to read/write/speak English to communicate with their counterparts all around the globe).

Editorial comment: The report seems to have mixed up the flight numbers reporting EZ-IZD performed flight VY-6107 from Amsterdam and EZ-LZZ performed flight VY-8305 from Rome. The flight trajectory in the final report makes clear flight VY-6107 flew through the localizer without joining the localizer (just as we had reported and shown in our trajectories in 2014). Hence it is clear the final report also mixed up the tail numbers, as flight VY-6107 was performed by EC-LZZ, not EC-IZD. We thus do not follow the final report in full and shall use VY-6107 instead of the tail number for identifying the flight flying through the localizer.

The final report concluded the probable cause of the incident was:

The incident was caused by non-execution of an ATC instruction by VY-6107 because:

- the crew did not hear the instruction
- another aircraft read back the instruction
- the read back from the wrong aircraft was not detected by ATC.

The CIAIAC reported VY-6107 had been cleared for the ILS approach to runway 02, however, the crew of VY-6107 did not hear the instruction. The flight therefore did not change its course and flew through the localizer instead of joining the localizer. This caused a loss of separation to VY-8305 resulting in a minimum separation of 200 feet vertical and 1.1nm horizontal with VY-6107 at 3500 feet MSL and VY-8305 at 3700 feet MSL. ATC instructed both aircraft to turn right, TCAS activated with resolution advisories for both aircraft which both crews followed. ATC subsequently vectored both aircraft back onto the ILS, both aircraft landed without further incident.

The CIAIAC analysed that a proper instruction was transmitted to VY-6107, the instruction however was read back by another aircraft. The crew of VY-6107 did not hear the instruction. ATC did not pick up the wrong aircraft had read back. About 75 seconds later ATC noticed VY-6107 did not turn onto the localizer, assessed the situation and provided vectors to both conflicting aircraft to turn right to avoid a risk. During that evasive maneouvers a loss of separation occurred.

The controllers working the sector had high experience with 27 and 17 years of experience, they had been in charge of the sector for about 90 minutes.

The instruction to VY-6107 to join the ILS runway 02 was clear, no distortion or overlaid other transmission. However, the crew did not hear the instruction, another aircraft read back the instruction instead, which was not picked up by the controller. The CIAIAC was not able to explain how this came together. The CIAIAC offers the theory that the instruction was expected in Castilian (local language) by the crew of VY-6107 and not in English as being transmitted, all ATC communication with VY-6107 had been done in English. The other flight had no digits or letters in common with the callsign of VY-6107. The explanation of local language and English thus is not sufficient or satisfactory to explain the communication issue.

The lack of a read back would certainly have been detected by the controller. However, as there was a read back and the controller did not detect the wrong callsign being used for that readback, the fact that VY-6107 did not receive the instruction remained undetected.

About 60 seconds later VY-6107 crossed perpendicular through the localizer still continuing on the previous heading. The controller noticed the wrong heading and position about 75 seconds after the instruction, the two aircraft VY-6107 and VY-8305 were still 6nm apart and about 45 seconds from the closed point. The controller assessed the situation and instructed both aircraft to turn right, the CIAIAC analysed this instruction was appropriate. The instructions were not immediately followed by both aircraft, VY-6107 initiated the right turn 18 seconds and VY-8305 19 seconds after that instruction, probably due to capabilities of the aircraft. In that time TCAS resolution advisories (RA) activated in both aircraft and took priority over the ATC instructions. Both crews responded according to the RAs.

The controller reacted calm and relaxed to the developing conflict, at the time he detected the developing conflict there was still sufficient room to avoid a loss of separation, in addition there was no other traffic that could have conflicted with the two aircraft. The controller thus did not make the instructions to turn right "urgent" and thus did not alert the crews of the conflicting traffic, it is possible that had he used the word "immediate" the crews would have reacted quicker. Both crews established visual contact with the other aircraft in addition to seeing the other traffic on their TCAS displays. The closest point, 200 feet vertical and 1.1nm was reached while both aircraft were already performing the evasive maneouvers, 20 seconds after that closest point the aircraft were 700 feet vertical and 2.5nm apart. The rest of both flights was without further incident.