Bob Moore wrote:

Nor was he required to since he had been cleared to maintain
visual separation.....and separation is separation.
One man's "near miss" is another's "missed him by a mile".

A few months ago I overheard something similar on Syracuse, NY's ATC feed.
A regional Dash-8 was being vectored north around the airport for an
approach while a student and instructor were flying some practice maneuvers
just north of the airport. Normally the instructional flight would have
been many miles further north, but there were low clouds in this designated
practice area.

The instructional flight was given a restriction to maintain at or below
2,000 feet and the Dash-8 was told to maintain 2,500 feet. ATC called the
C172 traffic for the Dash-8 and the pilot of the Dash-8 replied he had
traffic in sight.

A moment later, the Dash-8 pilot called ATC to report that he was
responding to a TCAS alert. He then made an unprofessional comment
directly to the C172 stating that there was no way they were at their
required altitude. ATC responded that through this entire event the C172
was at the altitude to which they were originally restricted.

Given the unprofessional comment made by the Dash-8 pilot, it seemed to me
that after calling traffic in sight, both pilots went heads down in
preparation for landing and the TCAS alert shocked them back outside.

--
Peter


















----== Posted via Newsfeeds.Com - Unlimited-Uncensored-Secure Usenet News==----
http://www.newsfeeds.com The #1 Newsgroup Service in the World! 120,000+ Newsgroups
----= East and West-Coast Server Farms - Total Privacy via Encryption =----