NEAR DISASTER | Takeoff and Taxiing Planes Almost Crash at Washington-Reagan DCA 

Controllers definitely messed up coordination up there. That quick "cross runway 4" during taxi instructions for Southwest, then Tower clearing Jetblue to take off... Also sounds like someone is in training in the tower? I beg familiar DCA pilots and controllers, if you're reading this, please email for further information on how operations work there when landing on 1 and departing on both 1 and 4.

This channel gets this up even before the FAA administrator reads about it on the daily briefing.

I really like the highlighting of the actively-talking plane combined with the darkening of the rest of the map. Please keep doing that, it's really helpful! Also, the map detail is fantastic. Nicely done!

A very wise flight instructor once told me in training that “if ATC makes a mistake they still go home that night. If you make a mistake you are likely not going home that night.” Words to live by for every pilot out there.

in this case, "i guess we need a phone number" is the polite form of "i want to talk to your boss!"

That Southwest dude took it like a champ! Just give me the number, I did nothing wrong anyway. He was clearly cleared.

It's a hair raiser when *_a new voice_* jumps on the coms and rapidly gives the stop order.

Southwest indeed was cleared to cross and clearly read back the clearance.

That one was on ATC. Good lord.

The woman who stepped on, I was based at DCa for years. I recognize her voice. That woman is the best controller in the NAS and I’ll argue with anyone over that.

Yup...went back and re-listened. SWA was given clearance to cross runway 4 and his read back included the instruction to cross runway 4. This one is on ATC for sure.

Vas, your individual aircraft identifiers is an awesome improvement. Well done.

Just noticed that CBS News used your graphics on their news report concerning this incident. Impressive.

Southwest was correct, great situational awareness there to realize the bad instruction. Great job as usual getting these up so quickly, Victor!

Another contributing factor is that the planes were on different frequencies as SWA was instructed to switch to tower when on the other side of runway 4...

I really appreciate the graphic. This video in particular I can see the effort that went in to making the visuals easy to understand. Thank you!

As an ATC in France it seems crazy to me that Ground controller is allowed to make planes cross an active runway. Here all active runways are under the responsibility of Tower controller. Runways de-ranked as taxiways are another story though.

I worked at Ohare Airport moving planes, I was shocked how many incompetent people were working there. There should be standards on hiring people when it comes to Aviation.

Tower goes on, pretending nothing happened and Southwest is like “nah, give me a phone number, I will have the talk”

Luckily this was in good visibility which surely helped both aircraft and also ATC spot the conflict. We don't separate aircraft on luck.

That golden moment when a pilot requests the phone number, rather than receiving the dreaded "I have a phone number for you". Major f*ck up in the tower...

I'm based in DCA. Lots of training, and they are getting too close for comfort for the last couple of months. Departing traffic with final traffic at 2 mi, loading crossing runways with line up and wait traffic. DCA tower and ground have been really pushing it lately. Every pre-departure briefing the number 1 threat we brief is DCA controllers and to stay on our toes.

I immediately got worried when the clearance to cross 4 was giving SO early. Isn't it more usually to give a 'hold short' and only when they get there to give them the clearance? Wonder whether there is a protocol there?

@VASAviation, Yesterday we were flying KSDF to KMSP and heard a pipeline declare mayday on guard somewhere in the vicinity of the Iowa City VOR (IOW). He was coming in broken but it sounded like he said he had a midair with something and was trying to maintain altitude. Would have been somewhere around 22:00Z.

We‘ve been getting these types of incidents at an almost weekly bases. The US seems to have a serious problem with runway incursions due to what I would guess is congested airports, overworked ATC and an apparent lack off safety systems. You‘d hope that after the JAL a350 accident every countries aviation authority would look into this topic.

Thats a huge screw up by the controller. This stuff is pilling up

Southwest got it doubly right. He was told to cross 4 and in his readback he even added the word "cleared" as "cleared to cross 4", almost as if his pilot spidey sense felt a problem was in the offing.

Great job by both pilots. They did proper readbacks, but they also both had good situational awareness and took appropriate action for the safety of their passengers.

Crisis of competence is only going to get worse.

Gobsmacked how quickly this video was put together. Well done!

Can we go a week without ATC causing another near disaster in America? Jesus.

PERFECT video with the audio. Thank you very much for this adding

Yep, that's on ATC for sure. DC Reagan absolutely needs a metering frequency to manage pushbacks, it is very difficult to handle both pushback and taxi clearances for so many aircraft and it shows that the challenge is causing errors.

This channel is gold.

Just saw this on NBC news. Wife says, WOW wonder what it sounded like happening. HANG On honey.. pulls up VASAviation.

First close call since January in DC. Glad everyone is ok. Thanks for the video VASAviation!

Great job @vasaviation. I listen to the DCA feed often as my office overlooks the airport and its fascinating. One thing I think missing from this video is the nuance of the timing of the other aircraft and how tight the sequencing is in such a busy space at DCA. Let me explain. --Tower clears Southwest 2830 (the other southwest aircraft) to line up and wait, Runway 1, traffic on a 6 mile final, just as Bluestreak 5226 is touching down. The intent is to launch two planes in that 6 mile gap. -- As Bluestreak 5226 rolls out on runway 1 and passes the intersection of runway 4, Tower clears Jetblue 1556 for takeoff rwy4. -- Tower then clears Bluestreak 5226 to turn left off of rwy 1 at N after landing, contact ground. The expectation at this point is JetBlue 1556 is mid-takeoff roll. (This is where the near collision occurs with Southwest 2937) -- The plan was that once JetBlue1556 crosses the runway 1 intersection on its takeoff from runway 4 (it likely has a right turn 060 departure heading, the tower is going to clear Southwest 2830 from runway 1 on the SID, which is NW bound. -- Lastly, the tower supervisor clears Southwest 2830 for takeoff runway 1 after the near collision. Even before addressing the Jetblue or Southwest 2937. That's because another plane (unknown call sign) that was 6 miles out a minute or two ago is likely on a 2-mile final, cleared to land I only bring up that sequence as I really think the timing and spacing plays such a pivotal role in tower planning, expectations, and clearances. Who knows why ground told SW2937 to cross 4, or why tower didn't hold JetBlue, or why they miscommunicated, but I think timing is a big part of it. Other general notes: The ground controller voice is not super familiar to me. Maybe new. The guy screaming in the background telling southwest to stop sounds very familiar. The initial tower controller isn't new. The tower supervisor who takes over has been there for a very long time.

Rachel saves the day! Love her!!!!!

Thank you very much for picking those Incidents up and publishing them!👍

With that busy of an airport, surprising ground would clear anyone in advance to cross active runways

The law of averages is going to catch up. One just can't have these kinds of close call all the time.

If that was today, quick on getting it up and Jet Blue is still on the ground with a 6 hour delay

Thank you, VAS.

As a pilot who operates into and out of DCA often, this is not surprising.

Thats one where the pilot should ask ground if they are ready to copy a phone number.

What is wrong with ATC in USA currently. So many near misses.

Wow! Nice job on the part of both crews avoiding a collision in spite of conflicting intructions.

Always helps to listen to all of atc instructions

The FAA in 2012 went to using biographical information to hire candidates rather than training and talent assessment testing (the test that was released in court documents showed things like: You would get 1 point on your score for every high school sport you played, several points if you were unemployed, and surprisingly if you have a pilot's license or previous experience you get 0 points) The FAA is still paying for this blunder and during this time thousands of students paying for their own training gave up trying to get in and moved on with their lives. They probably are not "understaffed", they just don't have enough qualified controllers. Reply

Why are there so many such incidents this year alone?!?! And why are almost all of them in the US?!?! I know they have a lot of air traffic, but Europe and Asia high traffic too especially in airports like LHR, AMS, DXB, HKG and CDG, but no notable close calls have been reported from there

Yes, near disaster, but luckily, the issue was realized and immediately addressed as needed. Great job by all on avoiding disaster!

Southwest was right, almost dead right. In all my years of flying I never crossed a runway without first making sure no one was landing or taking off on it. USE YOUR EYES!!!

Possible controller deviation. Please copy this number.

ATC be really polite when they know they f'd up haha

Been retired now for three years. Can’t say that I missed the job.😎

Tower asking how much time they need to clean out their drawers

It is only a matter of time before a lot of people die in an incursion like this. I'd rather be late than dead.

I’m DCA based and there’s a couple controllers there who screw the whole place up. I’m genuinely surprised this doesn’t happen more often. It’s crazy there.

Good job on both Pilots for seeing the conflict. The taxing aircraft stopped before the runway. The aircraft on the roll rejected when they saw the conflict.

All is well that ends well .... I often wonder how many times I have been a passenger and had a near miss without having a clue! Makes me feel very small indeed.

This is one clusterf***k of an airport layout.

Good job done in the end. No panic, no angry shouting. Mistake was made, mistake was corrected, just, and everyone went on with their day. Pax will never know.

This is the reason why, when I was going through the ground control portion of my training for VATSIM USA, they have a policy in effect that controllers never grant clearance to cross an active runway until the aircraft is actually at that runway. If the runway is closed and not being used, then they can clear its crossing during the rest of the taxi instructions, but not if it's actively being used for departures or arrivals. Seems like that would be a good rule for the real world ATC, too.

I love that wrong readback from the Swiss at the end, but the controller caught it. Good job!

Every day we get closer to a Tenerife disaster. There really needs to be reform in how planes are coordinated on the ground.

When did they hire TSA to do air traffic control?

thanks for the info

I bet that JetBlue pilot was shaking after that. Holy hell.

Southwest was cleared to cross, yes. BUT: “clear left, clear right, cleared to cross” is supposed to be the catch all here. Now, it’s entirely possible that’s what saved the day, as SWA did say “we’ve stopped,” but it’s really important to make sure we’re doing it all the time, every time. One other observation, DCA has *no* stop bar lights or wig-wags. This needs to be fixed *yesterday,* especially for the crossing of 4. It’s way too easy for someone not familiar with DCA to think that’s just a taxiway.

At least everyone responded appropriately and no one got hurt.

This was an interesting one. The ground controller obviously wasn't communicating with tower but her comm was also odd. She said "cross 4 at c" she didn't say cleared to cross rwy 4 at c and the pilot clearly said "cleared to cross 4". I wonder what the outcome of this incident was

I'd have said "Ready to copy phone number for a possible controller deviation..." Had something similar happen to me in MDW. Stay vigilant everyone...Nice job with the video, keep this stuff coming!!

It looks like the FAA's "Be ATC" campaign is alive and well

Clearly what happens when you don't take the best and the brightest for the position of ATC anymore.

In my country. When crossing a runway the instruction has to always come when you reach or are close to the rwy hold short point. Clearing that SWA to cross when he was still on the ramp was a huge mistake and no communication between TWR and gnd controllers

Absolutely agree the SWA flight was given clearance to cross however I can't remember a time I've ever crossed a hold short line without my training telling me to confirm runway is clear of departing/arriving traffic and doing a visual confirmation with the other pilot. It's airmanship 101

This is why the local or tower controller should be doing all the runway crossing instructions, not ground.

This is Boeings fault some how

If they had that much difficulty at DCA, imagine if this happened at ATL? So glad it was avoided!

That was sickening. ATC cleared SWA to cross runway 4 right here: :32 Victor, this is a great illustration to go with the audio!

Good thing the flight crews were paying attention! Controllers definitely dropped the ball on this one. Then that call to Bluestreak was timed very unfortunately. DCA seems like it really needs runway status lights if it doesn't have them.

Holy! Looks like that happened this morning and JBU1554 still hasnt even gotten back on track and you already have a video out, complete with appropriate emoji faces and all. You are a pro, sir.

Excelent vídeo!! Congrats!!!

This crap keeps happening more and more often in the US. Absolutely ridiculous.

woah nelly that was too close!

The FAA needs to be led by a commercial pilot who specializes in safety, no w a lawyer who specializes in EV aircraft.

I don't understand this situation yet, but after binge watching these things for a few weeks, this was the first time I've heard a controller raise his/her voice. And from the background, too! As a nonaviator, I was surprised at how viscerally that affected me. I've told my kids to stop like that when they were learning to drive and hearing her was the same feeling. I realized after a moment that I wasn't breathing. Scary.

This is bad. Southwest should've been instructed to taxi to and hold short of RWY04 and given a separate instruction with clearance to cross RWY04 and continue to the hold short of RWY01. I'm sure JetBlue noticed Southwest before Southwest noticed JetBlue, but thankfully both crews were fast-acting and professional. Also, telling planes to "stop" is not the same as "Abort/Cancel Takeoff" or "Hold Position." We are taught specific language as pilots for a very good reason. So there is minimal confusion in instruction.

Is there some sort of automated runway incursion alerting system installed at DCA?

I don't blame Southwest because ground said, "Cross 4 at Charlie", and Southwest read back "Cleared to cross 4 at Charlie". Then Tower cleared Jet Blue to take off. Southwest could have radioed back, "We see an aircraft lined up on 4, do you still want us to cross?" before crossing the line (forgot the name) at the runway. But this really is an ATC issue.

Great content!

Scary stuff. It also just so happens that the Southwest plane involved was their new “Imua One” special livery. Glad it all worked out and nothing bad happened, but sheesh.

In contrast to the “dangerous” frequency switch that occurred in Toronto last week, no berating, no condescending chatter, just a muted, professional response. Mistakes happen, we’re supposed to learn from them, not verbally take it on the chin like the YYZ occurrence.

Wow hope they are OK

I've been on that flight about 100 times in the E190, and never used a runway other than 1/19.

Wow! Have never seen how this works. Very interesting.

is it normal for ground to clear someone to cross an active runway in the US? I just normaly see airports have tower handle the taxiways between two runways

F me, that was TOO close.

This is the reason why I would ask again every time before crossing a runway “confirm cross rwy 4?” (when an aircraft is lining up or on final)

Everyone sounded so calm and matter of factly. But I’m sure there were plenty of people involved asking themselves “Who the F*ck dropped the ball here..what the f*ck are you doing?”