Two Qantas flights almost collided at Sydney Airport this week, marking a fourth near miss at the airport in a month.
The Australian Transport Safety Bureau confirmed two Qantas aircraft, an Airbus A321 and a Boeing 737, had a near miss on Tuesday.
The safety bureau says “there was no immediate risk of collision”, evident by the fact pilots in one of the involved planes applied their brakes as per normal and came to a stop.
The circumstances make the event a safety “incident”, rather than a “serious incident” under the safety bureau’s rules, but they will investigate anyway.
“(ATSB) has elected to conduct an investigation to understand the potential conflicting instructions to the flight crews and whether there are any contributing factors common across the other Sydney Airport incidents currently under investigation,” a spokesperson said on Friday.
Investigators will interview the air traffic controllers and flight crews involved and look at the available recorded data.
The safety bureau’s spokesperson said a preliminary report would be pushed in six to eight weeks, but any critical safety information that comes to light would be released sooner.
According to the investigation summary, the Boeing 737 coming from Melbourne was heading west and had clearance to turn right.
However, at the same time, an Airbus A321 was ready to depart for the Gold Coast and also had clearance to turn.
“As the Airbus approached taxiway … the flight crew observed the Boeing approaching from the left and brought their aircraft to a stop while the Boeing passed ahead of them,” the statement read.
“The ATSB notes there was no immediate risk of collision, with the Qantas A321 aircraft braking normally before coming to a stop.”
A Qantas spokesperson said the airline would support the investigation, and that both aircraft had been “cleared to proceed following instructions from air traffic control”.
This is the fourth near miss at Sydney Airport in three weeks.
On July 27, a landing QantasLink flight from Canberra and a taxiing Qantas Boeing 737 from Queenstown had a near miss on the tarmac when the one plane was given clearance to enter the runway to enter the runway the other plane was landing on.
Two near-miss incidents happened on August 9. Virgin Australia flight VA555 from Sydney to Perth, and Qantas flight QF728 from Sydney to Ayers Rock Airport, were involved in a runway incursion and rejected takeoff.
Later that day a Jetstar A320 and a Qatar Airways Boeing 777 almost collided.
The air traffic controllers union, Civil Air, has previously said roster at Sydney Airport are often issued with spaces, relying on staff to work overtime.
Roster data was leaked anonymously to The Australian and published this week, showing eight of Sydney Airport’s 17 controllers had done more than 200 hours of overtime in the past year.
One controller had done more than 900 hours.
A short-staffed air traffic control tower means delays at the airport, as happened on Wednesday when departures were spaced apart by at least three minutes.
The air traffic control agency, Airservices Australia, is owned by the federal government, and had recently set itself a target to increase staff numbers by 10 per cent.
“We know that recent air traffic disruptions at Sydney Kingsford Smith Airport have been frustrating for passengers, airlines and airports,” Airservices Australia chief executive Rob Sharp said earlier this month.
“I want to assure the public that safety is not compromised when issues with staffing levels occur. We put in place measures that reduce the traffic levels to ensure safety, but this can lead to flight delays.
“We are building a larger pool of standby air traffic controllers to increase our staffing contingency numbers at Sydney Kingsford Smith Airport, reduce overtime and deliver stable rosters,” he said.
The agency had trained and certified 55 air traffic controllers nationally so far this year, with another 40 expected.