N. Las Vegas Mid-air

Per liveatc, Piper was cleared to land 30L. Appears the flight track is consistent with an approach to 30R.

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If I recall correctly, unfortunately, North Las Vegas airport has a higher than average number of incidents/accidents.
 
If the tapes show the Piper was cleared to land 30L, and ended up on final for 30R, there’s the problem. Even so, the tower usually points out or mentions traffic for the other runway, don’t go past centerline.
 
sourdough44 said:
If the tapes show the Piper was cleared to land 30L, and ended up on final for 30R, there’s the problem. Even so, the tower usually points out or mentions traffic for the other runway, don’t go past centerline.
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The Malibu is registered to a Florida LLC. I suppose it's possible the pilot was unfamiliar with KVGT and made a mistake. But there was a readback from the Malibu on the 30L landing clearance. The 172 was cleared to land on 30R.

The area of the storm water retention channel where the 172 crashed is directly off the threshold of 30R.

I guess circumstances align, fate decrees, and all that. It's terrible.
 
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HIgh wing/Low Wing too. . . possible that neither pilot saw it until the last second.
 
Listened to the LiveATC and the 172 was cleared 30R and the Piper 30L. Tower even confirmed 30L after the initial clearance and the Piper read back 30L both times but appears to have lined up 30R anyway
 
I would have the thought the tower would have wanted positive confirmation from the Piper he had the Cessna in sight. Sad
 
nrm2430 said:
Listened to the LiveATC and the 172 was cleared 30R and the Piper 30L. Tower even confirmed 30L after the initial clearance and the Piper read back 30L both times but appears to have lined up 30R anyway
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This happened to me once at PDK. I was cleared to land 3R. Another plane was cleared to land 3L. He passed underneath me as I was on short final. Tower gave him a number to call after I announced the situation and proceeded to go around. We got lucky.
 
sourdough44 said:
If the tapes show the Piper was cleared to land 30L, and ended up on final for 30R, there’s the problem. Even so, the tower usually points out or mentions traffic for the other runway, don’t go past centerline.
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That would be interesting, indeed.
 
Apparently the Piper was returning from a type safety seminar. That approach looks a little on the wild side to me, fast, tight circle. RIP
 
Ed Haywood said:
Similar to the midair at Centennial last year. Seems like tower would be dialed in on the risks of merging approaches on parallel runways, and use timing to create separation.

https://www.pilotsofamerica.com/com...tennial-airport-cirrus-and-metroliner.132133/
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That's what I would wonder, why have aircraft converging onto final side by side. That scenario is ripe for conflict, an overshoot, an accidental turn to the wrong runway, a low wing aircraft being blind to the outside of the turn. Tower should call the base turn to not put aircraft into that situation.
 
At KHEF we have parallel runways with aircraft that converge to final from either side. Has happened more than once where I am on a base-2-final for 16R and another aircraft meanders over across 16L final. Doesn't happen as much on the 34 side I guess due to 34L being much longer. Tower is really good about barking at these transgressors early on in their excursion. Haven't had to do a go-around because of this yet, but I pay very close attention when I am cleared to land 16R and tower tells me there is an aircraft landing the parallel. Controllers do an amazing job here, by the way. The way they manage parallel ops with several flight schools (both fixed and rotary wing) as well as busy bizjet traffic on runways with with left and right traffic patterns... Yeah they are really good.
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Fearless Tower said:
Are there any controller requirements to stagger arrivals to parallel runways?
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Some. Usually involving IFR procedure including Visual Approaches. There are Wake Turbulence criteria that come into play. I can recall nothing that would require the Controller to positively control the spacing in this situation though.
 
Ed Haywood said:
Seems like tower would be dialed in on the risks of merging approaches on parallel runways, and use timing to create separation.
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That’s next to impossible considering controllers have no control over when someone actually turns base. All we can do is give traffic to each aircraft on parallel runways. Pilots winge enough as it is and “no controller is going to dictate how I fly my plane.” is a common theme on this forum.
 
Deelee said:
At KHEF we have parallel runways with aircraft that converge to final from either side. Has happened more than once where I am on a base-2-final for 16R and another aircraft meanders over across 16L final. Doesn't happen as much on the 34 side I guess due to 34L being much longer. Tower is really good about barking at these transgressors early on in their excursion. Haven't had to do a go-around because of this yet, but I pay very close attention when I am cleared to land 16R and tower tells me there is an aircraft landing the parallel. Controllers do an amazing job here, by the way. The way they manage parallel ops with several flight schools (both fixed and rotary wing) as well as busy bizjet traffic on runways with with left and right traffic patterns... Yeah they are really good.
View attachment 108726
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Used to frequent KHEF back in '99 and '01. Is Bob Hepp still running the flight school there? I flew with him when he was a 3 airplane operation at Potomac. That was before all the post-911 restrictions when the airspace was still fairly casual for VFR.
 
Timbeck2 said:
That’s next to impossible considering controllers have no control over when someone actually turns base. All we can do is give traffic to each aircraft on parallel runways. Pilots winge enough as it is and “no controller is going to dictate how I fly my plane.” is a common theme on this forum.
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"Piper XXX, extend downwind, I'll call your base." Happens all the time at my airport and FWIW I have yet to hear a single pilot argue over it.
 
Fearless Tower said:
Does tower there have radar?
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Probably. Next question would be what kind. My guess is a feed from an ASR at either Las Vegas or Nellis. A thing to keep in mind about Radar is it rarely sees where an airplane is or what it is doing now. ASR's have a sweep rate of about 4 1/2 seconds. So at any glance a the scope you may be seeing what happened 4 1/2 seconds ago. The progress of what's happened over the previous 2, 3, or more sweeps ago. It simply can't tell you what the pilot is doing 'right now.' The 'resolution' of ASR is not super precise. It's not like a high update type Radar like PAR. Now, keeping all of that mind, lets add in these Runways are only 700 feet apart. Even if the controller was staring at the scope, not doing anything else, ignoring everyone else, it would be very hard to detect that that Malibu was overshooting/had overshot in a timely enough manner to have saved the day here using Radar.
 
Timbeck2 said:
That’s next to impossible considering controllers have no control over when someone actually turns base. All we can do is give traffic to each aircraft on parallel runways. Pilots winge enough as it is and “no controller is going to dictate how I fly my plane.” is a common theme on this forum.
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Well I won't argue because you clearly know far more about the subject than I do. But, I was under the impression that the literal definition of class B/C/D airspace is "a controller dictates how I fly my plane." I have certainly had base turns called or downwind extended to deconflict traffic. I was always grateful for the assistance and happy to comply.
 
flightwriter said:
"Piper XXX, extend downwind, I'll call your base." Happens all the time at my airport and FWIW I have yet to hear a single pilot argue over it.
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Happens all the time at my home 'drome as well. Seems to work fine. I prefer it to getting a '360 for spacing' instruction
 
flightwriter said:
"Piper XXX, extend downwind, I'll call your base." Happens all the time at my airport and FWIW I have yet to hear a single pilot argue over it.
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They're pretty good about that here, too. Common call when the flight school is flying is "traffic for the parallel runway is an archer, turning base, report in sight". You won't get cleared to land until you report them in sight or the controller can tell it won't be a factor.
 
Flocker said:
This happened to me once at PDK. I was cleared to land 3R. Another plane was cleared to land 3L. He passed underneath me as I was on short final. Tower gave him a number to call after I announced the situation and proceeded to go around. We got lucky.
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Sounds like you were diligent in your duty to watch for traffic, not lucky unless you didn't see him until after he was under you.

Sounds like there does need to be some ATC guidance on avoiding the potential for this, but two pilots who should be looking for each other actually doing so is needed too. I'm based and KCPS where we have parallels, and am always paranoid when there is another aircraft nearby going to the other runway.
 
flightwriter said:
"Piper XXX, extend downwind, I'll call your base." Happens all the time at my airport and FWIW I have yet to hear a single pilot argue over it.
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The controller cleared one guy to land on the right and another on the left. Both repeated their runway. One guy screwed up and now the collective minds are thinking up ways for controllers to prevent stupidity.

Unfortunately that’s not going to happen.
 
Timbeck2 said:
The controller cleared one guy to land on the right and another on the left. Both repeated their runway. One guy screwed up and now the collective minds are thinking up ways for controllers to prevent stupidity.

Unfortunately that’s not going to happen.
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Yeah...but if the controller is gonna provide instructions oblivious to the fact the two aircraft will essentially converge at the same point in space even if parallel runways without warning to each of the pilots the controller is just as much at fault IMO.

Yea, it is ultimately on the pilots to see and avoid but that comes with an assumption that a controller is not going to create a dangerous situation where two pilots unaware of each other resulting in a deadly mid-air

Have not heard the tapes but if there were not clear traffic advisories to each of the pilots in a situation like that tower is just as complicit IMO.
 
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Timbeck2 said:
The controller cleared one guy to land on the right and another on the left. Both repeated their runway. One guy screwed up and now the collective minds are thinking up ways for controllers to prevent stupidity.

Unfortunately that’s not going to happen.
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Prevent stupidity, no. However, it's worth having a discussion about how we can create better margin for mistakes. I know I've made my share.
 
GaryM said:
Happens all the time at my home 'drome as well. Seems to work fine. I prefer it to getting a '360 for spacing' instruction
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A few years ago I was on final to KTKI RWY 12 and a single that had just landed stopped on the runway and stayed there for 30 seconds or so. The tower controller asked me to do some "slow S turns" to provide separation, to which I said "Unable, 24W is going around."

There was no way I was going to waddle around out there at approach speed with flaps out and stabilized to land.
 
I don’t know anything about the flight paths or whether or not they were converging or not so I can’t comment on that. I can’t comment about what traffic was issued either. I can only comment that this is a pilot forum and when a tragedy happens, fingers start pointing to controllers. There are so few of us here but I’ll admit that it gets old.
 
Shawn said:
Yeah...but if the controller is gonna provide instructions oblivious to the fact the two aircraft will essentially converge at the same point in space even if parallel runways without warning to each of the pilots the controller is just as much at fault IMO.
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Did I miss where the VGT tower controller asked the PA46 to do a continuous turning overhead entry to 30L in lieu of typical midfield-cross-to-downwind?

I'd be curious what you would add. The AIM is already large enough to bludgeon someone to death with.
 
Timbeck2 said:
I don’t know anything about the flight paths or whether or not they were converging or not so I can’t comment on that. I can’t comment about what traffic was issued either. I can only comment that this is a pilot forum and when a tragedy happens, fingers start pointing to controllers. There are so few of us here but I’ll admit that it gets old.
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I'm not bad mouthing or blaming the controllers. They are doing as they are required to do in this situation, and the Malibu pilot is the one that lined up on the wrong runway for whatever reason.

I just question creating the scenario of two aircraft being turned into each other in close quarters, with restricted visibility in the turn towards each other. This same exact scenario played out at Centennial just over a year ago. I've also read that there were two frequencies in use, one for each runway. Its possible neither aircraft knew the other existed, much less did not have the opportunity to see and avoid by the nature of the maneuvering required.

Otherwise, what is the purpose of having ATC if not to help prevent collisions? Why help setup the swiss cheese to align?
 
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