From the latest preliminary report, we can read
The airplane pilot
requested an en route altitude of 3500 feet.
and
The tower controller advised the airplane and the pilot of
another helicopter operating in the area of each other and
instructed the pilot of the airplane to remain at or below
1,100 feet.
I understand this to be, that as soon as the plane had cleared the other helicopter, it should be told to continue climb to requested altitude. However, no such instruction from TEB was given, only
At 1152:20 the Teterboro controller instructed
the pilot to contact Newark on a frequency of 127.85
So a likely scenario would be;
The pilot have continued at 1100', changed the frequency to Newark, but not immediately contacted them. Therefore, he would not have heard the calls from TEB or the helicopters position report on the CTAF, and when Newark seemingly did not try to call the plane(no callsign at hand?!), but instead called TEB to ask them to resolve the conflict, the faith was set.
As for the helicopter-pilot, he would most likely be on CTAF only, and not got a reply on his pos-report indicating no traffic in the vicinity concerning his route.
puntosaurus,
'see and avoid' is a myth.
Yeah, right!!
Controllers also stuff up from time to time as well, some with a slightly worse outcome than others though.
I have had controllers line me up head to head with a MD87 circling to land, which is not so nice regardless of machine you're in.
Same tower managed to do the same thing with a DC9 and a 747, resulting in a TCAS solution.
Being told by ATC to alter course due to oncoming traffic even a vertical seperation of no less than 5000 feet!!!
Being told to decend below 1500 feet outside a controllzone and report traffic in sight(Airbus..somehting) due to approaching traffic to an airport 16NM away. I could barely see the airplane!!
List is much longer....
An old rule I heard in when in pilot-training.
1.ATC f..k up: ATC lives, pilot dies
2.Mechanic f..k up: Mechanic lives, pilot dies
3.Pilot f..k up, pilot dies, ATC and Mechanic lives, unless pilot give Mechanic a lift and crashes with the tower....
The following should never have been possible, and I'm sure that if you had tried to make this happen it wouldn't have. Talking about the holes in the swiss cheese lining up.....
http://www.pprune.org/rumours-news/5...ny-merged.html
FH1100 and Gordy
rick1128,
As for the JAR's, can you just immagine how the JAR's would look if they would have stated the things you're NOT allowed to do.
The FAA is not trying to be the "back seat-nanny" as the European CAA trying to be. Accidents happen in Europe too despite lots of more restrictions and less trafficdensity.