The Federal Aviation Administration says an American Airlines plane arriving at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport discontinued its landing, performing a go-around to avoid getting too close to another aircraft departing from the same runway
ARLINGTON, Va. (AP) — An American Airlines plane arriving at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport discontinued its landing, performing a go-around at an air traffic controller’s instruction to avoid getting too close to another aircraft departing from the same runway, the Federal Aviation Administration said.
The maneuver involving American Flight 2246 from Boston happened about 8:20 a.m. Tuesday, less than two hours before another plane attempting to land at Chicago’s Midway Airport was forced to climb back into the sky to avoid another aircraft crossing the runway. Southwest said Flight 2504 from Omaha, Nebraska, safely landed “after the crew performed a precautionary go-around to avoid a possible conflict with another aircraft that entered the runway,” an airline spokesperson said in an email. “The crew followed safety procedures and the flight landed without incident.”
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The American flight “landed safely and normally” at National Airport after air traffic control instructed pilots to complete a go-around “to allow another aircraft more time for takeoff,” American Airlines said in a statement.
“American has a no-fault go-around policy as a go-around is not an abnormal flight maneuver and can occur nearly every day in the National Airspace System,” the airline said. “It’s a tool in both the pilot’s and air traffic controller’s toolbox to help maintain safe and efficient flight operations.”
Aviation experts said the maneuvers are not entirely uncommon on commercial flights for various reasons, from bad weather to a deer walking on the runway. Pilots can execute a go-around maneuver without much notice from passengers if the plane is still flying high enough on its approach.
“It probably happens more than you and I realize,” said Robert Joslin, a professor of practice at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University’s College of Aviation in Daytona Beach, Florida. “It’s not always just because (the plane) is getting ready to hit somebody.”
Joslin pointed to recent data from the Federal Aviation Administration. Nearly 4 out of every 1,000 arrivals at the nation’s 30 busiest airports involved go-arounds in fiscal year 2023, according to a recent FAA report. For context, the FAA handles about 45,000 flights a day.
Pilots are trained to conduct go-around maneuvers, Joslin said. And when pilots are relying on instruments to fly an approach to a runway in weather with low clouds, they are required to plan for the possibility of a missed approach.
There are many reasons why pilots could abort a landing, including flying too high and too fast or not being lined up with the runway, Joslin said. Another aircraft could be taxiing on the runway when it’s not supposed to or air traffic controllers could have mistakenly cleared a plane to cross a runway.
“Is it a pilot issue? An air traffic control issue? A weather issue? A wildlife issue? You name it. There are a wide variety of reasons for it,” said Joslin, who previously served as the FAA’s chief scientific and technical adviser for flight deck technology.
Twenty-one people were injured Feb. 17 when a Delta flight flipped and landed on its roof at Toronto’s Pearson Airport.
This story has been edited to restore a dropped word in the name of the university where Joslin is a professor.
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