Passenger plane landed at wrong airport due to pilot error
A passenger plane accidentally landed at a disused military airfield in Indonesia which the pilots had mistaken for their destination airport eight miles away.
The captain and first officer of the Sriwijaya Air flight allegedly ignored both their onboard navigation system and written warnings that Tabing airfield is sometimes mistaken for Minangkabau International Airport in Padang, Western Sumatra.
The plane, with 96 passengers, was flying from Medan on the east coast of North Sumatra.
The incident happened in 2012 but the final report into the incident has only just been published by the National Transportation Safety Committee.
The report said the pilots requested permission from air traffic control to land at Minangkabau International after saying they had the runway in their sights.
On landing, they called the tower to confirm that they had arrived, but Minangkabau’s controllers saw that no plane had landed on runway 33.
"The Minang Tower then coordinated with the Tabing Airfield authority and the district manager of the aircraft operator," said the report.
Linsey McNeill
Editor Linsey McNeill has been writing about travel for more than three decades. Bylines include The Times, Telegraph, Observer, Guardian and Which? plus the South China Morning Post. She also shares insider tips on thetraveljournalist.co.uk
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