Cirrus SR22 N416DJ vs Metroliner N280KL: Mid Air near Denver

dublinpilot wrote:

Or would the aircraft be expected to be both on final, aligned with the runway, before they are allowed to be side by side?

You are expected not to overshoot your turn. That’s all. The Cirrus apparently overshot BOTH centerlines and flew right through the Metroliner. You cannot legislate for stupidity….

172driver wrote:

You are expected not to overshoot your turn. That’s all. The Cirrus apparently overshot BOTH centerlines and flew right through the Metroliner. You cannot legislate for stupidity….

Yes no excuse to overshoot but it’s not that obvious for someone from flat land who has not flown “alti-ports” before? the airport is high density altitude (6500ft DA yesterday?) and I think US does not have mountain ratings or site checks? but a proper self brief should include budgeting for wide pattern in airports & expect wide turns in the valleys, as TAS is higher on same IAS, I have to admit it’s not something that did cross my mind the first time as flat land flyer, but it’s pronounced and it’s one of the underlying reasons why one may overshoot their turn in valley or runway axis on final…

17R/35L is less than 700 feet to the west of 17L/35R. As a reference, full scale deflection at the threshold on an ILS to 35R or the LPV to 17L is +/- 350 feet. These parallel runways are super close to each other and there are no IFR approaches to the 17R/35L runway.

172driver wrote:

You are expected not to overshoot your turn. That’s all. The Cirrus apparently overshot BOTH centerlines and flew right through the Metroliner. You cannot legislate for stupidity….

I ask because I don’t know. It’s not a rhetorical question, but a genuine one! The reason for my question is because if it’s allowed, then it seems obvious to me that this will eventually happen. On a certain (non-trivial) percentage of occasions a pilot will overshoot the centreline. Especially so from 4.5km out where it’s going to be harder to judge the centreline’s actual position. Judging 200mtrs from 4.5km out, isn’t a trivial judgement.

Hands up anyone who has never overshot the centreline when turning onto final?

I would hope that where there are close parallel runways, and an aircraft on approach to both runways, that the pilot would be extra cautious, but mistakes and misjudgements do happen.

Mooney_Driver wrote:

I think the owners of the Metro will have a couple of $$$ they want from him too…. what is the maximum coverage they get for 3rd party insurance? Enough to pay for a replacement? I doubt it.

First they will need to be sure that he did in fact overshoot the centreline, and that the Metroliner was on its own centreline. From FR24, this isn’t very clear because of the low resolution of the track. Has the radar trace been published?

dublinpilot wrote:

The Cirrus was on a right base, just turning right onto final at the point of contact. Is this normal procedure in parallel runway operations? Or would the aircraft be expected to be both on final, aligned with the runway, before they are allowed to be side by side?

Yep, But if you listen to the youtube video on this. The metro was alerted that there would be an aircraft in front of him on, no reported sighting. The cirrus was given the metro and reported sighting, he had the responsibility to see and avoid, he could already see he just needed to avoid. He could have safely overshot if he simply avoided the metro liner. Not a huge difference from just using a single runway IMHO. From a traffic avoidance perspective that is almost how you need to treat it, i.e. you can’t ignore the other traffic. Which is what appears to have happened.

The cirrus may even be distracted by subsequently losing the metro, which caused the overshoot in the first place. (if that is what actual happened)

dublinpilot wrote:

I ask because I don’t know. It’s not a rhetorical question, but a genuine one! The reason for my question is because if it’s allowed, then it seems obvious to me that this will eventually happen.

OK, got it. Yes, it is. Done all the time at KVNY, KTOA and KCNO, to give you just three local (L.A. area) examples with several hundred movements / day. Usually ATC will warn you of parallel traffic and you tend to aim to __under__shoot the centerline so as not to stray into the parallel flightpath.

Ibra wrote:

I have to admit it’s not something that did cross my mind the first time as flat land flyer, but it’s pronounced and it’s one of the underlying reasons why one may overshoot their turn in valley or runway axis on final…

That’s an interesting thought. I have no idea where the Cirrus (or the pilot, if a rental) was based, so hard to say if it was considered.

Edit to add: I just checked, the Cirrus was based in Colorado, so the pilot would have been aware of the issue.

172driver wrote:

Cirrus was based in Colorado, so the pilot would have been aware of the issue.

Not one of the culprits then, he would have flown that pattern many times…

Ted wrote:

Yep, But if you listen to the youtube video on this. The metro was alerted that there would be an aircraft in front of him on, no reported sighting. The cirrus was given the metro and reported sighting, he had the responsibility to see and avoid, he could already see he just needed to avoid. He could have safely overshot if he simply avoided the metro liner. Not a huge difference from just using a single runway IMHO.

Thanks Ted. That make sense. I’ve not seen the youtube on it yet. Will seek it out later. Indeed if the pilot was reported visual with the Metroliner, then the centreline no longer matters. Their job at that point was to avoid the other aircraft, even if the other aircraft moved into their space.

But just to illustrate the point I was making about judging where the centreline is, here is a google Earth shot of the airport.

The white circle shows the 4.5km distance from the airport where the incident happened. The yellow line near the top is the 200mtrs misjudgement that is required to cross the other centreline. It’s really a small error that far out.

But as I said, once the pilot confirmed visual with the other aircraft, then the centrelines become irrelevant.

All the major public GA airports in my area have a similar parallel runway configuration, e.g. three of them within 20 miles, and it is more the norm than unusual. Those three have over 1500 combined operations per day.

Very often when cleared to land on an extended base I will take a short cut or very large radius turn to short final versus squaring off the base-to-final turn. Like entering downwind on a 45, this lowers the accuracy of flying required and provides an opportunity to spot traffic on final for the parallel runway.