CHICAGO, Nov. 15 (UPI) -- Officials credit a collision-avoidance alert with preventing an in-flight collision 25,000 feet over Indiana following an error by air-traffic control.
An eastbound Midwest Airlines plane descended into the flight-path of a westbound United Express jet Tuesday evening because air-traffic control accidentally removed the jet's electronic identification tag from radar, the Chicago Tribune reported Thursday.
The pilots of the Midwest plane performed an emergency climb when the collision-avoidance alert warned of the flight-path violation, Federal Aviation Administration investigators said.
"If they didn't suddenly climb, there would have been a convergence," Midwest spokeswoman Carol Skornicka told the Tribune.
The error is one of several incidents since Oct. 1 attributed to errors by air-traffic control. The controllers union and management are at odds over staffing levels.
"These controllers are fatigued from working such long stints and very few breaks compared to just three years ago," said Jeffrey Richards, president of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association at Chicago Center.
