According to the Daily Dawn, Iranian Air Traffic Control (ATC) cleared the same height for both PIA jets, resulting in the planes flying in the same direction and at the same altitude.
An Airbus A320 flying from Doha to Peshawar and an Airbus 777 flying from Islamabad to Dubai got dangerously close to one another over the Iranian airspace near the United Arab Emirates.
According to the report, the planes’ built-in systems for avoiding traffic collisions, known as Traffic Collision Avoidance Systems (TCAS), were able to detect the impending threat and signaled for one of the aircraft to climb while commanding the other to descend.
All planes include TCAS, which communicates with the TCAS on other flights to automatically direct the plane.
According to a statement from a PIA representative, “PIA is writing to Iranian air traffic control (ATC) to investigate since the Iranian ATC commanded the jet, but it was wrong.”
By way of explanation, the spokesman stated that the Boeing 777 from Islamabad to Dubai was flying at 35,000 feet when it got within a few hundred feet of the Airbus A320 from Doha destined for Peshawar.
Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) Boeing 777 PK-211 flight would have been in the route of the PK-268 flight when it was cleared to drop to 20,000 feet, the airline official said.
The representative said that both flights were automatically directed by the aircraft’s TCAS system, which corrected their path.
