An air traffic controller at Phoenix International Airport (PHX) is winning praise for the calm way that he handled two American Airlines planes with the exact same callsign heading towards one another with just a couple of thousand feet vertical separation between the two… Something that the controller said he hadn’t seen in 25 years of doing the job.
The strange scenario played out late on Thursday night as American Airlines flight AA-2482 bound for Chicago O’Hare, operated by a Boeing 737, departed Phoenix Sky Harbor just behind schedule at around 11:58 pm.
In the opposite direction, however, another American Airlines Boeing 737 with the exact same callsign was heading towards Phoenix Sky Harbor as it came towards the end of a three-hour flight from Chicago O’Hare.
The reason that two planes with the same callsign were not only in the air together but also so close to one another was that the flight from Chicago had departed the Windy City nearly two hours late on the evening of August 13.
In the United States, it’s not unusual for airlines to use the same callsign for both the outbound and inbound flight, although this is normally the case when the same aircraft is operating both sectors.
Presumably, given that American Airlines has hubs in both Chicago O’Hare and Phoenix Sky Harbor, rather than delaying both sets of passengers, the carrier was able to find a spare plane and crew to operate the Phoenix to Chicago sector at the scheduled departure time.
To say that the air traffic control handling traffic around Phoenix was surprised by this unusual situation would be an understatement.
“I’ve been working air traffic for 25 years, and I’ve never seen two aircraft pretty much merge with the same callsign… that’s pretty incredible!” the controller exclaimed.
The situation required careful coordination as both arriving and departing flights were being handled on the same air traffic control frequency. As a result, it could have been easy for the pilots to confuse instructions given by the controller, especially as their routes required them to fly over one another with just vertical separation.
In the end, the controller managed the situation in the most low-tech way possible, simply appending the words ‘On the arrival’ or ‘On the departure’ to the plane that he was referring to.
Having successfully handled the two planes crossing over each other, the controller made it clear that this was by no means a normal situation. “That could have been disastrous,” the controller told the pilots.
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