Quote:
both pilots would no doubt have been listening to RT for some minutes before the event and should have been aware of the other.
Absolutely agree. Just a thought - as earlier posts have said, a final ATC clearance for this join is typically given when positioned north abeam Worthing Pier to "descend to circuit height, join crosswind
and report downwind". I have often found when joining crosswind at Shoreham (eg. when traffic is light) that I am not asked to report crosswind. So, there could have been a period of a few minutes with no ATC exchange with the joining a/c before the collision as it hadn't quite reached downwind.
Having done that very crosswind join so many times, once over the upwind numbers I'm busy looking at the downwind leg to merge with any traffic approaching from my right and would not have seriously imagined (until now) there would be a serious conflict with an a/c taking off below and to my left, especially if the take off clearance is for an immediate left turn out - which is unusual, but could well turn out to be the case here as it fits better with the evidence available and provides a scenario in which every party involved acted professionally and rationally.
I find Shoreham ATC superb at alerting and helping to deal with possible conflicts.
This thread has personally made me question a whole load of assumptions and issues about crosswind joins etc.. Many thanks.