Right plane - wrong airport!

Capt Lightning

Capt Lightning

Well-known Member
Location
Historic Buchan, Scotland
A British Airways flight destined for Düsseldorf in Germany has landed in Edinburgh by mistake, after the flight paperwork was submitted incorrectly.
The passengers only realised the error when the plane landed and the "welcome to Edinburgh" announcement was made.

:biggrin-new::biggrin-new::biggrin-new:
 

I have heard of planes that have landed at the wrong airport but could not take off due to shorter runways!!
 

On its final flight on Sunday, the plane flew to Edinburgh and back so it seems that someone at WDL mistakenly repeated the same flight plan for the next day, according to BA.
When the crew arrived at London City airport on Monday it is thought that they saw Edinburgh on the flight plan from the day before and followed the old flight route.
German firm WDL said it was "working closely with the authorities to investigate how the obviously unfortunate mix-up of flight schedules could occur".
"At no time has the safety of passengers been compromised. We flew the passengers on the flight with number BA3271 to Düsseldorf after the involuntary stopover in Edinburgh," it said.
BA declined to say how many passengers were affected by the mistake.
 
Many years ago I was on a plane and as it approached the runway there was a large warehouse and on the roof was painted a sigh that said "Welcome to Des Moines". Except it wasn't Des Moines, it was Omaha if I remember correctly.
 
What's all the fuss about? They found the right continent.

Must admit, you'd think someone might noticed that the gear had gone down before they had flown over the North Sea!
 
When a pilot here in the U.S. boards their plane for their assigned flight, there is a bar code on the wall of the galley before entering the cockpit. I would just hold my iPad up to that bar code, take a picture of it using the app and my flight plan would appear. Then, we just compare the flight plan that the company has also filed with the FAA. Both must match before we can depart. If they both match, we enter the flight plan into the FMS (Flight Management System), which is that small computer that sits in the console between the two pilots. Each pilot has his/her own FMS.

Even so, it is still possible to land at the wrong airport. New York City has three airports and Tetterboro, NJ is just across the river from NYC. I have known pilots, especially in small commuter and private jets, that have become confused and have landed at the wrong airport. If the pilot and the Air Controller both are not paying attention, it is possible that the pilot could get vectors to the wrong airport in that area, especially if the pilot has already locked onto the localizer for the ILS.

Sounds confusing, I know. But, my point is that it can and does happen. In fact, it had happened several years ago to some of the bigger planes, but never the wrong airport in the wrong country.
 
I wish that I would have read the BBC report before commenting. It makes sense now how this happened. It appears from the article that the flight was being flown by another company in cooperation with BA.

What the pilots did was use the flight plan from the previous day, which was the London to Edinburgh plan. The article states that the plane sat on the tarmac for 2 1/2 hours before flying onto Düsseldorf. Of course, some passengers had to complain that the one toilet was clogged and unusable and they ran out of snacks.

It’s understandable that some (most) of the passengers were upset over the error, especially if people had to be somewhere by a certain time. Otherwise, it’s best just to go with it and laugh about it later. I’m sure they were all compensated by BA. They are a first class airline. Of all the foreign pilots that I ever met, BA had the most amiable.
 

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