A Wing And A Prayer: Planes That Almost Crashed

Military Near Miss over Syria

Perhaps the most nerve-wracking, near-miss scenarios involve military planes, and you probably heard about this one in 2016. A Russian fighter jet and US military plane nearly collided, while they were flying over Syria. They were both flying super fast, with their lights off.

With all the tension inSyria,and the overarching tension currently present between the US and Russia, one US military official admitted that “people will not interpret this as an innocuous mistake.” There’s an increasing likelihood of such tense situations happening, according to US Air Force Lt. Gen. Jeffrey Harrigian, “because the United States has moved additional aircraft into the air above northwest Syria…” How many near-miss incidents like that happen, we can only wonder…

Planes Miss Collision in Hawaii

In the case of a near collision over Hawaii, the air-traffic controllers were to blame for the assigned altitude, according to the NTSB. In the incident, a United Airlines Flight 1205 was headed east to Los Angeles from Kona InternationalAirport,and had to descend quickly when they received an audible warning of the impending collision with the US Airways jet, which was headedwest bound.

The FAA immediately began investigating the incident, and then a joint FAA-NTSB team arrived at the Honolulu Control Facility to continue the investigation. Pilot Les Abend pointed to the fact that the collision avoidance system worked, saying, “You’re going to run into this situation, unfortunately. Nothing is perfect. I know that’s not a comforting answer, but indeed the system worked.”