Two aircraft came close to a mid-air collision as a trainee air traffic controller told a pilot: “Er, I’m not sure which way to go now.”
Near-miss investigators revealed that the two aircraft, one of which was a 78-seater airliner operated by the budget airline Flybe, came within about a mile of each other near Exeter airport.
A report published by the UK Airprox Board said that a trainee controller with “only a little experience of this type of scenario” was involved.
The incident occurred on July 15 when the trainee was supervising a flight from Norwich to Exeter as it made its second runway approach to land.
The first approach had been abandoned because of “conflicting unknown traffic”. It was at this point that