NEW YORK (AP) -- Two British Airways Concorde jets traveling faster than 200 mph came too close to one another as one was landing while the other was taking off from Kennedy International Airport.
The Federal Aviation Administration is calling Thursday's incident "operational error," possibly due to a mistake by air traffic controllers, spokeswoman Arlene Salac said.Shortly after 9 a.m. Thursday, British Airways Flight 1 from London was preparing to land while Flight 2 to London was taking off from a nearby runway.
The closest the planes had been was about 800 feet vertically and about three-quarters of a mile horizontally, Salac said. The planes were about 8 miles from the airport at the time, she said.
Although the needle-nose supersonic planes were close, Salac said the incident did not qualify as a near collision.
British Airways and Air France are the only scheduled airlines flying the Concorde in the United States.
The plane is popular with celebrities, world-class athletes and other rich people. It flies above turbulence at nearly 60,000 feet, crossing the Atlantic in about 3 1/2 hours, less than half that of regular jetliners.