Austrian A319 and Austrian DH8D at Vienna on Jun 16th 2017, loss of separation, TCAS resolution advisory

Last Update: May 27, 2019 / 14:59:11 GMT/Zulu time

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Photo of Austrian Airlines OE-LDG, Airbus A319 — Austrian Airlines OE-LDG, Airbus A319 (Photo credit: 陈霆, Ting Chen, Wing / Flickr / License: CC by-sa)

Incident Facts

Date of incident
Jun 16, 2017

Classification
Incident

Airline
Austrian Airlines

Flight number
OS-727

Departure
Vienna, Austria

Destination
Podgorica, Montenegro

Aircraft Registration
OE-LDG

Aircraft Type
Airbus A319

ICAO Type Designator
A319

An Austrian Airlines Airbus A319-100, registration OE-LDG performing flight OS-727 from Vienna (Austria) to Podgorica (Montenegro), was climbing through about FL060 out of Vienna's runway 29 about 14nm south of Vienna Airport.

An Austrian Airlines de Havilland Dash 8-400, registration OE-LGJ performing flight OS-706 from Prague (Czech Republic) to Vienna (Austria), was descending through about FL080 on approach to Vienna about 14nm south of Vienna Airport.

Austria's Sicherheitsuntersuchungsstelle des Bundes (SUB, accident investigation board) reported the occurrence was rated a serious incident and is being investigated. OE-LDG was departing from Vienna's runway 29 while OE-LGJ was on a left downwind for runway 34 when a loss of separation and TCAS resolution advisories occurred.

On Jul 15th 2017 The Aviation Herald learned that the Dash 8 was given a "turn right heading 090" instead of a left turn. The instruction and its execution actually created the conflict. The A320, initially below the Dash, climbed above the Dash 8 during the conflict resulting in a minimum vertical separation of 0 feet with undetermined lateral separation so far.

On May 27th 2019 Austria's SUB released their final report in German ((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 German 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). The report concludes:

To turn aircraft A (Dash 8) from magnetic heading 145 to magnetic heading 090 in order to have the aircraft join a right downwind for runway 34, a left hand turn would have been necessary.

The SUB however reported the aircraft was instructed to turn right onto heading 090. As result of the ATC instruction the minimum separation between the two aircraft reduced to 300 feet vertical and 1.2nm horizontal.