The Federal Aviation Administration is probing a second incident in just a few months at San Francisco Airport involving Air Canada.
In the latest runway mishap, the FAA is investigating why air traffic control’s instructions were not acknowledged as the plane came in to land.
Fearing another aircraft on the runway, air traffic repeatedly warned Air Canada Flight 781 to abort and ‘go around’ but there was no response for some time.
When the jet was within sight, air traffic controllers used a red light gun to alert the pilots which is ‘standard protocol’ in the event of radio communications problems.
"The Air Canada crew did not acknowledge any of the controller’s instructions. The tower controller subsequently instructed the Air Canada crew multiple times to execute a go-around because he was not certain that a preceding arrival would be completely clear of the runway," said FAA spokesman Ian Gregor.
In the event, the previous jet had actually left the runway and the Air Canada flight was able to land safely without incident.
It follows an incident on July 7 at SFO when an Air Canada jet almost struck planes on the ground after it lined up wrongly to land.
It actually lined up to land on an adjacent taxiway but managed to abort just moments from a possible ‘catastrophe.’
