Italy, 2006 - Near miss between Italian Viper and airliner
Posted: 23 Feb 2010, 18:20
Have a look...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7DygPsJ_sA
This happened on the Medytherranean Sea because of a malfunctioning transponder (as far as I understood).
Translation of the dialogue between the two pilots in Italian at 3:42 (before the near miss)
Wingman "Heading?"
Leader "160"
W "Good, on the radar I have hdg. 360"
L "Eh eh!"
W "But... what's that thing passing by?"
L "What?"
W "Oh, an aircraft is passing by us!"
L "Sh*t!"
(escape manoeuver)
L "Heading? Have you seen it?"
W "Of course I did, it passed through me!" (he actually meant "by me")
L "Maintain the locks of me (???), let's climb again to 360"
Translation of the dialogue at 4:41
W "Haven't you seen it before?"
L "Negative"
W "I could see it, I thought it was 1000 feet below us as usual, but it was at my flight level!"
L "I saw it, I'm breathing"
W "You saw it when I called it?"
L "Confirm"
W "I saw it but I thought it was 1000 ft below, you know... another one passed before"
Trans. 5:58
W "That's why it passed close to us"
Description of the accident on http://cencio4.wordpress.com
I don’t know how this (leaked?) video was obtained. I’m not even sure it will remain online for a long time. The Belgian user who uploaded should be careful since I’m pretty sure the footage was not meant to be publicly disclosed, but maybe he got all the permissions required. You can see an impressive near miss recorded by an Italian F-16. Radio comms can be heard as well.
Aircraft involved are two ItAF F-16s of the 37° Stormo, based in Trapani (radio callsign “Brandy”). Date of the near miss is Dec 13, 2006. The aircraft are apparently returning to their homebase after some kind of exercise; they are in contact with “Cyrano” (a French E-3 AWACS) that clears them to climb to FL360 for RTB. Then, the two fighters are handed over to Rome Military radar that tries to identify the mission but can’t estrablish the radar contact with it. The two aircraft continue climbing to the previously cleared level and level off at FL360 when the wingman spots something that is coming from the opposite direction, same level, between the two F-16 (that are most probably flying a loose formation). At time 03:30 you can see the contrails of the commercial jet appearing on the left side. The leader of Brandy 41 sees the incoming liner at the very last moment and performs an escape manoeuvre. The cause of the near miss is obviously not clear: for sure the two aircraft are given from Cyrano a clearance to climb to 36.000 feet. The E-3 has coordinated the climb and they are under radar control. They contact Rome Military telling the controller “….climbing 360…” and they repeat the information as they give their position and altitude (“360, 100 NM from RONAB”) shortly before the close encouter, when they are requested to check the C mode. Something unclear occurred (I think on radar controller side….) but a fine weather, a watchful wingman and a certain amout of luck contributed to the happy ending.
Question: what is "C mode?"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P7DygPsJ_sA
This happened on the Medytherranean Sea because of a malfunctioning transponder (as far as I understood).
Translation of the dialogue between the two pilots in Italian at 3:42 (before the near miss)
Wingman "Heading?"
Leader "160"
W "Good, on the radar I have hdg. 360"
L "Eh eh!"
W "But... what's that thing passing by?"
L "What?"
W "Oh, an aircraft is passing by us!"
L "Sh*t!"
(escape manoeuver)
L "Heading? Have you seen it?"
W "Of course I did, it passed through me!" (he actually meant "by me")
L "Maintain the locks of me (???), let's climb again to 360"
Translation of the dialogue at 4:41
W "Haven't you seen it before?"
L "Negative"
W "I could see it, I thought it was 1000 feet below us as usual, but it was at my flight level!"
L "I saw it, I'm breathing"
W "You saw it when I called it?"
L "Confirm"
W "I saw it but I thought it was 1000 ft below, you know... another one passed before"
Trans. 5:58
W "That's why it passed close to us"
Description of the accident on http://cencio4.wordpress.com
I don’t know how this (leaked?) video was obtained. I’m not even sure it will remain online for a long time. The Belgian user who uploaded should be careful since I’m pretty sure the footage was not meant to be publicly disclosed, but maybe he got all the permissions required. You can see an impressive near miss recorded by an Italian F-16. Radio comms can be heard as well.
Aircraft involved are two ItAF F-16s of the 37° Stormo, based in Trapani (radio callsign “Brandy”). Date of the near miss is Dec 13, 2006. The aircraft are apparently returning to their homebase after some kind of exercise; they are in contact with “Cyrano” (a French E-3 AWACS) that clears them to climb to FL360 for RTB. Then, the two fighters are handed over to Rome Military radar that tries to identify the mission but can’t estrablish the radar contact with it. The two aircraft continue climbing to the previously cleared level and level off at FL360 when the wingman spots something that is coming from the opposite direction, same level, between the two F-16 (that are most probably flying a loose formation). At time 03:30 you can see the contrails of the commercial jet appearing on the left side. The leader of Brandy 41 sees the incoming liner at the very last moment and performs an escape manoeuvre. The cause of the near miss is obviously not clear: for sure the two aircraft are given from Cyrano a clearance to climb to 36.000 feet. The E-3 has coordinated the climb and they are under radar control. They contact Rome Military telling the controller “….climbing 360…” and they repeat the information as they give their position and altitude (“360, 100 NM from RONAB”) shortly before the close encouter, when they are requested to check the C mode. Something unclear occurred (I think on radar controller side….) but a fine weather, a watchful wingman and a certain amout of luck contributed to the happy ending.
Question: what is "C mode?"