Two jets collide over Florida (Bradenton-Sarasota)

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5 known dead.

-- Charles Underwood Farley (chuck@u.farley), March 09, 2000

Answers

Details, please. I'm here, looking up. Or down, as the case may be...

-- Normally (Oxsys@aol.com), March 09, 2000.

Not up on AP yet, or CNN.

-- lisa (lisa@yeah.yeah), March 09, 2000.

AP link>/a>

-- lisa (
lisa@work.now), March 09, 2000.

http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/20000309/us/planes_collide_3.html

Thursday March 9 1:50 PM ET

2 Die As Small Plane Collide in Fla.

BRADENTON, Fla. (AP) - Two small planes collided on a runway at Sarasota Bradenton International Airport today, killing four people in a fiery explosion, officials said.

Reports that one of the planes was taxiing off the runway and the other was either taking off or landing when they collided at 10:37 a.m. could not immediately be confirmed, said airport spokesman Jim Naiman.

The collision caused an explosion and fire. Naiman said four people were killed.

One of the planes was a single-engine Cessna. The other aircraft was not immediately identified.

The National Transportation Safety Board was investigating what went wrong.

This is the second crash at the airport in the last 24 hours. A single-engine aircraft had trouble with its landing gear and belly landed at the airport Wednesday. There were no injuries in that incident. The airport is about 50 miles south of Tampa.

-- viewer (justp@ssing.by), March 09, 2000.


You know, I'm surprised that this sort of thing doesn't happen more often (it probably does and I'm just not aware of it). A friend took me up in his single engine plane , a Cessna (sp?) I believe, and we flew out of and back into a small private airfield that had no tower or other means of air traffic control. Everything was visual and radio contact between the pilots. Didn't exactly give me a whole lot of confidence.

-- Michael (123@456.789), March 09, 2000.


Michael, Most of my flying is out of small uncontrolled airfields, and yes, everything is visual with radio contact between the pilots. Its called the "see and be seen" principle, and it is MUCH safer than relying on the control of someone in a tower somewhere. Pilots who are used to flying in uncontrolled airspace are always keeping a very good lookout for other aircraft particularly in the circuit area, and are therefore seldom suprised by having another aircraft suddenly appearing out of no-where.

When you say that you are suprised that collisions don't happen more often, you may also be suprised to know that most collissions occur in controlled airspace rather than uncontrolled, and are usually the result of pilots assuming that because they have clearance to enter an area, that the Air Traffic Controller will take responsibility to ensure that no other aircraft are near. In every case the final responsibilty for safety of an aircraft remains with the pilot, not with a controller.

-- Malcolm Taylor (taylorm@es.co.nz), March 09, 2000.


Always happens when you least expect it. I still feel a little safer at a controlled airport because most of the pilots don't trust those tower nimrods anyway so they haven't abandoned the 'see and be seen'. So between them and us it makes it makes the spacing more acceptable. I use a light gun anyway so it makes it more interesting!

-- Crop Duster (lowandslow@crop.com), March 10, 2000.

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