SFO Near-Miss: A Small Plane Perspective
I promise you, Saturday wasn’t the first time a jumbo jet and small plane got into each other’s personal space over SFO. It’s happened to me, too.
After learning to fly at the nearby San Carlos Airport (SQL), I would make frequent trips through the busy airspace in order to access some of the most supreme sightseeing on the planet.
(A recent SFO Class B transition in a C172)
The Class Bravo transition is the best path home from the Golden Gate Bridge. Alcatraz. And anywhere else you’d like to leave your heart.
Over downtown San Francisco, I’d call NorCal approach with my request. The usual instructions: follow the freeway south to SQL, and remain west of Highway 101 at 2500 feet.
About 3 miles from SFO, they’d switch you to the tower.
The controller would then tell you what to do next: proceed along the freeway, fly over the airport, or push you even farther to the West. And that’s where my encounter occurred.
Similar to this recent incident, a heavy Boeing came barreling off runway 28L toward Asia and into my path, which by then had been pushed over towards Interstate 280 in San Bruno.
As I watched the jumbo get even bigger, SFO suddenly chimed in: “JAL 152 Heavy, stop your climb, maintain 2000 feet, Cessna crossing right to left 500 feet above you.
The 747 flattened its hump and thundered under our nose, as a big smile crossed my face. Hey, sometimes the little guys get priority after all.
But now I realize, maybe that wasn’t supposed to happen. Or perhaps the controller that day caught our conflict just in time to kept us legal.
Either way, if it wasn’t for these startled United Airlines pilots, it would have been just another Saturday in the skies over SFO.
