Two Southwest Airlines planes were forced to take evasive action to avoid a collision Saturday in Nashville after an air traffic controller directed one of the pilots to turn into the path of the other plane.
Last year, an American Airlines plane collided with An Army Black Hawk helicopter near Washington, D.C., killing all 67 people aboard both aircraft. The incident, which occurred on January 29, 2025, highlighted mid-air collisions, which are rare on commercial flights where planes are equipped with systems to alert pilots about a potential collision.
Most of the close calls that occur each year involve small planes that don’t have those systems, but the FAA could not immediately provide a figure for how many occur annually. There are usually several collisions involving small aircraft each year That happened In February 2025 in Arizona, killing two people.
Both Southwest pilots involved in this incident over the weekend told air traffic controllers that they received alerts from their collision avoidance systems that directed them to take action with one plane climbing while the other was flying to avoid a potential mid-air collision, according to audio he released. www.LiveATC.net.
Position data from these two planes shows their flight paths converging after one of the pilots decided to abort the landing and circle around to try again. The controller directed that plane to turn into the path of the other Southwest plane that had just taken off. By the time the controller realized the threat and tried to direct the just-take-off plane to stay below 2,000 feet, the pilot reported that he was already above that level.
Location data appears to show the two planes were close to 500 feet apart with one flying over the top of the other, according to FlightRadar24, so that fits the official definition of a near mid-air collision. But it may not be clear exactly how close the planes were to the plane until the accident is reviewed.
The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating. The pilot of Southwest Flight 507 “received instructions from air traffic control that placed the flight in the path of another aircraft that was departing from a parallel runway. Both flight crews responded to alerts on board,” the agency said.
But the Federal Aviation Administration did not say how close the two planes came during the incident, which occurred around 5:30 p.m. on Saturday.
Southwest Airlines spokeswoman Lynn Lunsford said gusty winds at Nashville International Airport forced the first pilot to take a spin. He said both pilots followed the directions of the air traffic controller and the plane’s on-board collision avoidance systems to avoid colliding with each other.
“Southwest appreciates the professionalism of our pilots and flight crews in responding to this event. Nothing is more important to Southwest than the safety of our customers and employees,” Lunsford said in a statement.