Air traffic control
versus pilots. Delta 1328. Stop! Stop! Stop! Delta 1328, aborting! Coming up! Hey, 74 crew! Welcome back! If you don't know me,
my name's Kelsey. I'm a 747 pilot. My channel 74 gear
is all about aviation. In this episode of Air
traffic control versus pilots, we have a small aircraft that's
taxing around a larger aircraft as it gets ready
to start its engines. And then we have two
aircraft on crossing runways that one confuse their call sign
so they take off at the same time. If you have a video that you
think would be great in the series, please just send it to my Instagram
74gear.com or the free forum. I wanna thank all of
you for sending these in. Honestly, without your help, we couldn't keep this going. All right. Let's get into it. Sanford ground Allegiant 269 Allegiant 269 ground. I don't know if you're aware. We had a
Cirrus just taxi by us on the right hand side of the taxiway where we're sitting here now
while our ground crew was disconnecting. Allegiant 269. I was just
observing that as well. I wasn't sure. There shouldn't have been
anybody on the taxiway there. Yeah, we are kind of surprised
because as we set the parking brake and the ground crew was getting ready to
disconnect while we are starting number 2 They were like, hey, we got some
guy trying to taxi around behind us, underneath our right wind. Roger. Yeah. I just wanted to
say something about it. I don't know if he was cleared or where
he was supposed to be going or what but, nonetheless, I think we'll probably file a
safety event report or something about that. Allegiant 269, Roger. One of the best parts
about flying a small aircraft is you don't have all
the rules that you have when you're flying
commercial aircraft. When you're flying
a commercial aircraft, your airline gives you a manual
of all the ways and the procedures that they want you to
do for every single step. When you're flying
a small aircraft, there are certain
rules you have to follow but they're not nearly as rigid as
when you're flying a commercial aircraft because a commercial
aircraft is owned by your airline. So they say: "This is exactly how we
want you to do everything". However, this
isn't the Wild West. This isn't the 1930s where you can
just basically do whatever you want. Because at that time,
there were no rules. So taxing around another plane when they're getting
ready to start the engines, that's never gonna
be acceptable. This is the video that got
sent in with part of the audio where the ground crew
actually recorded the plane going underneath the wing while they were getting
ready to start their engine. Air traffic control usually
gives you very rigid and strict and clear instructions of how they
want you to get to your destination or where they want you
to move on the airport. And then hold short
of a specific spot. However, during the peak
of the COVID pandemic, when I was flying
around a lot of cargo, there were times where I'd landed
an airport and they would say: "Oh, you can taxi to
park however you want" "You're cleared to
cross all runways. There's no another plane
scheduled to land or take off here for the next couple of hours". Which was just crazy because
some of the airports are really massive. So in this scenario here
where you have this person that's taxing around a plane, even though they might have been given
some instructions to head that direction, it doesn't mean that you
can just bypass all rules to go wherever you want to go. So this is a chart
of the airport where this is all taking place. And I'm going to make some
assumptions of what is happening here. The Allegiant plane has gotten pushed
back from one of these gates here, and I'm assuming
they're facing west. So they're probably gonna be planning
to depart runway nine left over here. What this means is that any
landing planes would have landed and been taxing back to park here
on Charlie, which is where they're at. And a small plane would be
heading over to this section right here of the airport to park. Now I couldn't find the audio of
actually what this Cirrus got told as far as what their
instructions were to go park, but I'm sure it was something
like: "Taxi via Charlie to parking" Something like that. The thing is that the plane
is sitting right here on Charlie. The controllers probably weren't expecting
a pilot to taxi around another plane that's on that taxiway that's getting ready
to start their engines like you see him
doing right here. There are some serious risk on
both sides for both the Allegiant aircraft and the Cirrus
aircraft in this situation. If the Allegiant aircraft were to start
the engine and they were to have some type of a malfunction
or something like that, the Cirrus plane that's behind it could
be affected and possibly hurt from that. Or if they were to start the
engines and add a bunch of thrusts for whatever reason, it could flip the
Cirrus over or really damage that aircraft. So there's some
serious risk there. As well, if plane that was
taxing around the outside of them were to have some type
of a malfunction or problem, or the Allegiant aircraft
were to evacuate out that side of the aircraft
for whatever reason. Now, these slides come out and then the
Cirrus is now chewing up into that slide. There's all kinds of
crazy possible scenarios of things that could go on in this particular instance. I'm not familiar with Stanford
as I've never flow in there. At some airports, you have a
ramp area which is uncontrolled. Meaning the Air traffic control isn't
directing you of exactly how to get out or move around in that area. However, that doesn't give you
authorization to do stupid or silly things. I'm assuming that the pilot had
to speak to someone in the FAA regarding this situation. And I'm hoping that it wasn't a
scenario of someone feeling entitled. Maybe you remember
that video I did a while back about the guy flying
into Bravo airspace and then arguing with
the controller about it. I'm hoping it wasn't
one of those situations. I'm also hoping it wasn't
one of these situations. This is an unrelated video of a
pilot with a code brown situation. If you aren't familiar with
the code brown situation, I will put a link to that video
that I did explaining that and all the possible
implications of what happens if you're flying with a
code brown situation. And while it is pretty funny to
watch something like that happen, it is not funny to have it
happen to you in real life. Ask me how I know. Delta 1328 be
advised similar call sign on frequency is Southwest 3828, cross
runway 31C and runway 31L, taxi via Y to 4R. We're cleared to cross 31C and 31L
Y to 4R, Delta 1328, we'll be aware. Southwest 3828, be advised similar
call sign on frequency is Delta 1328 and once you approach
31R as you're crossing it, you can switch over the
tower, have a good day. All right, we'll be
listening to that and switch over the tower as
we approach 31R Southwest 3828. Midway is Chicago's other
airport. It's a really small airport. They have a lot of
runways in a very small area. I used to fly in
there all the time when I was at the regionals and the controllers
there and the O'Hare, they both do an amazing job with the
volume of traffic that comes in there and keeping things
moving very quickly. What's happening in this situation is you
have two planes with similar call signs, and what the controllers do,
which I think is a great idea, I don't know who
came up with it, but I think it's
an amazing idea, is they will call
you and tell you, "Hey, there's a plane with
a similar call sign to you". So that really helps you
differentiate and focus more. As far as when they're
saying your specific call sign. The thing is when you're talking
with another person up there, sometimes you only catch the
tail end of what you're saying. So your call sign might
be Boeing one, two, three, but if you're talking with the
other person doing checklists or talking about the taxi instructions
as far where you're gonna go and you hear Boeing, but you may not hear all
of it because you're talking, then you hear 1, 2, 3, but there's another
Airbus. 1, 2, 3, for example, then you're going to be
confusing and maybe thinking they said Boeing 1, 2, 3 because you heard the call
sign, blah one, two, three. So what they'll say is advise
similar sign on frequency. So that way, if you
hear just 1, 2, 3, and you weren't sure if you
heard Boeing one, two, three, you'll call and verify that you
got the actual right instructions because there's another similar
plane with your call sign on it. So Air traffic control is
advising these two aircraft: "Hey, there's another plane
that's on this runway that is going or on this airport that has
a similar call sign to you. So be advised and pay
extra close attention". That's what's happening so far. This is a chart of Midway
where all this is happening. You have Delta 1328
is going to be told to line up on this
runway right here, which is 4 right. And Southwest 3828 is going to be taking off this
runway right here which is 31 center. Something you should also be
aware of is this is a hub for Southwest. Southwest's one of their
main bases is Midway. So they typically have the home
field advantage if you wanna say that because they're gonna
be familiar with that airport, all the different procedures
going in and out of there. So they're gonna be more
familiar typically speaking, because that being their home
base, it's where they go in of and out of all the time. The risk is that when
you're at your home base is that sometimes you
can get complacent. Sometimes you're better at
following and picking up everything, but you can also be complacent and
get used to hearing certain instructions and not necessarily listening. On the other side of
that, you have Delta which is it's not their
home, but you know, you have Atlanta and a few
other bases, but it's not Midway. So when I'm flying into an airport
that I'm not very familiar with, or that I don't go
there very often, I try to listen more closely
or pay more attention and focus more because now I need to think
more about what's going on. However, because
that's going on, you're not necessarily
familiar with all the taxiways. You can also make mistakes. So both have their advantages and
disadvantages of flying into airports you are very familiar with
and totally unfamiliar with. There's an advantage
and a disadvantage to both. So here is the setup. Southwest will be taking off here
and Delta will be taking off from here. And obviously these
are crossing runways. I think you know what's
gonna happen next. Listen up. Delta 1328 Midway Tower, traffic holding
in position on the crossing runway. Traffic on a 4 mile final
landing on your parallel and a traffic on a 10 mile
final 4R lineup and wait. Line up and wait 4R Delta 1328. Southwest 3828 Midway Tower Runway 31C,
lineup and wait. Don't plan on stopping. 31C line up and
wait Southwest 3828. Southwest 3828, traffic holding
in position on the crossing runway, traffic on a 3 mile final for the
crossing runway. No delay please. Turn left heading 250 runway 31C
cleared for takeoff the wind 060 at 9. Delta and Southwest
talking over each other. Two called at once Southwest
3828, just to verify no delay left to 250 31C cleared for takeoff. Cleared for takeoff 31C, no
delay heading 250 Southwest 3828. Southwest 3828. Delta 1328. Stop! Stop! Stop! Delta 1328, aborting! I've talked about
this in past videos but when two pilots or two people
are speaking at the same time, we call it "being stepped on" and
this is what it sounds like right here. Delta and Southwest are reading back
at the same time talking over each other. Southwest 3828. But in that scenario, the pilots
that are both stepping on each other, both are taking the call back and
both of them are stepping on each other. Southwest, who was the
last one to finish talking, would've known that
Delta had taken that call. Because they both started
transmitting at the same time. When you're transmitting, you can't hear anybody
else transmitting. You're the only one
that's transmitting. The only person that
would be able to hear what was going on was
the Air traffic controller. So in this scenario, you would
be the Air traffic controller, hearing that two people
are talking at the same time, but you notice that
Southwest finished talking last, which lets the controller know that Southwest was
the last one to finish reading their
clearance for takeoff. Listen to this. Delta and Southwest are reading back
at the same time talking over each other. Southwest 3828. There was a clue for both
crews of who was gonna go first. If you listen at the beginning, when
he first tells Delta to line up and wait, then he calls Air... Then he calls Southwest and
tells them don't plan on stopping. Listen to this again. Southwest 3828 Midway Tower Runway 31C line up and
wait. Don't plan on stopping. Now, maybe that's not something
you heard when you first listen to this, but if you're sitting there and you have
a similar call sign to another aircraft, and you're at a place like
Midway where there's a lot of traffic that's happening and you hear the other aircraft
get told don't plan on stopping, that tells you they're gonna
be going before you are because you're on
a crossing one way. So they're not gonna let two of
you take off at the exact same time. So he's getting told,
just plan on not stopping. And you're being told,
in this case you're Delta, you're being told, you're just
gonna be lining up and waiting. So that's the clue. Southwest is hearing that
expecting they're gonna be going first. Delta should be
listening to that thinking they are gonna be going first. So that's the first
clue of what's going on. The second thing that, even
with the similar call signs, the second thing that is important
to hear is the actual runway. Usually, when you get
onto a runway you say: "Runway 31 center, 4 left", whatever the runway
is, you'll get on and you'll verify that that is
the runway that you're getting on because there's been accidents
where pilots line up on the wrong runway and then the runway is too
short for their aircraft or whatever. It wasn't a completed runway and they
confused the left side of the right side. There's been some
instances like that. So in that reason
you have a lot of crew. When they line up onto a runway, the crews will say: "4 left inside and outside" or "on the grass and on the glass",
meaning they see it outside on the field but they also matches up
with all the computers inside. So they'll say
things like that, right? So if they would've said that as
they were getting onto the runway, let's say they're
getting onto 4 right. So they're getting onto 4 right but then the controller says: "runway 31 center"
or whatever runway that's not your runway. Then that should be
your second indication: "Hey, that's not the
runway that we're on". Listen. Two called at once. Southwest
3828 just verify, no delay left to 250 31C cleared for takeoff. A bell should have gone off for the
Delta crew because they're on 4 right. And 31 center is
getting clear for takeoff. So even though it's a similar
call sign, it's not the same. Even though it's
a similar call sign, they're hearing a different runway
from the runway that lined up on. So that should have
been the second indication: "Hey, there's
something not right". One of those two pilots
should have heard that. Now it's happened to me when I'm coming
to land, let's say I'm the flying pilot. And let's use Miami,
which has runway 9 and 27, which is typically the
runway that we land on. When we're landing on runway 9, which is the primary
runway all the time. One time, I don't know,
three, four months ago we were coming in and the winds
were going the other direction. So we had lined up and
planned to land on that runway. The controller
said "Boeing 1, 2, 3 you're cleared
to land runway 9". Now here's the thing. That's the same piece
of pavement, right? Runway 9 and runway 27. But I said: "Hey, no,
he said 9 we're on 27". And he said, "Oh, yeah". Okay. So he called
back and said: "Confirm land runway 27". And then controller
said: "Yeah, affirmative. You're cleared
to land runway 27" So the reason that's important is because
let's say something were to go wrong. We were to land on that
same piece of pavement. There's nobody else out there but we go and land on that
same piece of pavement. If we go and land there and
then something were to go wrong, another plane were to
come out or who knows what? If there was any type of
accident at all whatsoever, the FAA, when they start looking at it,
would look at something like that and say: "Hey, You got cleared
to land on runway 27, not runway 9 or
runway 9, not runway 27" Or he said: "Boeing 1, 2, 3 was cleared to
land and you're Boeing 3, 2, 1" Even all those things,
it doesn't matter. If it's not your call sign and that
right runway and you land on there and something goes wrong,
you're gonna be in trouble. So it's really important to
listen to those specific terms. When you get cleared for
takeoff or cleared to land that you're using the exact same
tail number, that's your tail number or the exact same call sign, because if it goes wrong, that's
gonna be part of the investigation. Does that have
anything to do with it? No. You're the only person that was
supposed to land on that runway, but another plane moved down and
because they weren't paying attention, just taxied down in
the middle and you, there was an accident. Now it's totally
their fault, right? If you had said back: "Cleared to land runway 27",
you wouldn't in trouble at all. But in this scenario, because you
said: "Cleared to land runway 9", and you were
landing on runway 27, now they start going: "Oh, well it looks like you weren't
paying attention" or whatever. Stupid. I know. But that's how it works. The controller had a clue that something
had happened that maybe there was a mix up. Because he read it back a second
time of who was cleared for takeoff. And that was another reminder to
the Delta crew that it wasn't them that was cleared
for takeoff, right? So he heard that two people
talking at the same time, stomping on each other that said: "Hmm". Normally, if you're saying cleared
for takeoff to a specific plane, there should only
be one read back. And typically somebody's
not gonna talk about: "Hey, I need a landing clearance" or
anything like that at the exact same time that you just cleared
another plane to land. Most pilots know that. So when he hears talking
on each other, he goes: "Hmm, that's not right". He says it again who
is cleared for takeoff. And then it stomped on again. So if you're the controller, which I
think it's exactly what happened here, he heard someone
else take that call twice. And he probably got up
on that window to look out to see exactly
what was going on. Listen to this. Two called at once Southwest
3828 to just verify, no delay left to 250 31C cleared for takeoff Now here's the thing. Both the Southwest
and Delta pilots are professionals, right? All of those guys are
professionals in what they do. So as they start their takeoff, they see that someone
else is taking off as well. And that's typically
what pilots are doing. They're paying attention
to their surroundings, or they should be in most cases. And the pilots that are at this
level have a lot of experience. So they're usually
listening to what's going on and looking at what's going on and they're paying
attention to what's going on. So in this scenario, both the Delta crew and the
Southwest crew, both of them saw "Oh man, there's another person that's
taking off at the same time". And they both aborted
at the exact same time, Air traffic control started
screaming: Stop, stop, stop. So there's three different
people trying to avoid this and these planes don't even
get anywhere close to each other. Now I'm sure you
may be wondering, why have a plane
line up and wait on a specific runway when they're
not gonna be cleared for takeoff? And they're gonna clear another
plane for takeoff at the exact same time. It's a fair question to ask. Look at this. There is a plane coming into
land on runway 4 left over here. His plan was to fire off Southwest
off of this runway 31 center. And once they
got out of the way, the plane here
could land on 4 left and then Delta could take off on
this one, 4 right at the exact same time. 99% of the time pilots are
gonna get this one right. This is a very rare occurrence. And that's why
it's on this series. A lot of the time that I put
this stuff on here, people go: "Oh, how often
does this happen?" Well, it's very rare and
that's why it's on here. But this is a great learning
experience for those of you that are planning
to become pilots, or for those of you that like
listening to Air traffic control to really start listening
to the intricacies when he says something like: "Don't plan on stopping"
or something like that, that's a clue of what
this controller is thinking. So you guys, as pilots and Air traffic
controllers, are working together as a team. So this controller is giving the
pilot, all of them, both crews, a heads up on who's
going first by saying that. Now that is something that just
take experience to start listening to because there's a lot of
stuff happening at Midway. There's a lot of traffic. You can see, you have a
plane taking off, one landing, then another one taking off. There's a lot that's going on
in a very small airspace there. The other thing to know is that Chicago
obviously has bad weather sometimes. And I've been in airports
with extremely bad weather. This type of thing
that you're seeing here, where things are
happening extremely fast, that is not the case
when things are really low visibility
or things like that. Because you have the tower is up
in the sky, so they can't see anything. The pilots are moving
slower because they can't necessarily see
the markings on the runway. So we're moving a lot slower.
It all goes super, super slow. So you would think: "Oh, that's a really
high risk time". But the reality is that the
planes get spaced out a lot more. Everything moves slower. So if you're experiencing delays during
the winter time or things like that, part of the reason is that everybody's
moving slower to be extra safe. When the visibility is perfect and blue
skies like it is today right now in Dallas, if you have those
blue skies all the time, you're moving quicker because
they're able to things off quicker. And they're expecting that the
professionalism from the pilots to catch up and pick up on
all the things that are going on. And so in this scenario, you have two planes
with similar call signs, one crew wasn't really paying
attention to everything that was going on and the other crew Southwest was
doing exactly what they were told. All right, let's listen
to the last part of this. Southwest 3828 Go ahead, sir. Yeah, we're Southwest from 31C,
Were we the ones cleared for takeoff? Yes, sir. You were.
You were the one. You were doing what
you're supposed to be doing. And Delta was rolling also? He took your call sign. Somebody kept stepping on you
and I couldn't figure out who it was. And then that's why I reiterated that it
was you that I was clearing for takeoff. Okay, we just got to run some
numbers and contact company. Roger. Delta 1328, same thing,
we got to call company. Roger. So now both crews are
gonna have to fill out reports. Air traffic control is gonna
have to fill out a report. And the Delta crew is probably
gonna have to go do some extra training of some kind. Simulator training or something like
that is probably what's gonna happen. I'm just making a guess here. But here's the thing
that's important to note. This was a very cheap lesson. And the reason say it's a
cheap lesson is because nobody was injured
or hurt in this situation. You see, Delta
learned something here. The crew here learned the importance
of really listening up to the other people or similar call signs. And I'm guessing that they
will probably never make this mistake again
in their career. And so what I call a cheap lesson
is something that you learn from, and it's gonna cost
you some simulator time and something like that, but it's gonna be a lesson
where nobody gets hurt. Nobody gets killed. And a lot of people wouldn't even have
really known that this had taken place. If it didn't end up
on a series like this. So it's important
that as a pilot, you're always staying ahead of
the game and something like this when you make a mistake, in this scenario,
when these Delta crew make a mistake, that's something that
they're going to learn from. If you're learning from your
mistakes and nobody's getting hurt, that's a cheap
lesson in my book. All right, now it's
time for the fun one. Center Southwest 1253,
starting to pick up some fairly continuous light chop.
Any ride reports up ahead? Standby. Exec Jet 670,
how is your ride at 400? 670, it's smooth here but I
expect that all pilot technique. Hahaha, right. Southwest 1253, Citation ahead of
you 40 miles. He is getting smooth. Well, I will have to work on
my technique then. Thank you. Very nicely said. Now obviously,
this pilot is joking. Usually there's two different
types of pilots that I've seen. You have the
self-deprecating pilots, which typically make the
jokes about how bad they are. And then you have the other side where the
pilots are joking about how good they are. Usually, it seems to be one
of the other, in my experience, when you talk to pilots
about their flying abilities. Earlier I talked about
a code brown situation. If you want to hear
more about that story, it's in my cockpit confessional
series, check out this video. And if you wanna see another
Air traffic control versus pilots, check this one out up here. I look forward to
hearing from you. Until then, keep the blue side up.
