Two Southwest Airlines planes came dangerously close in Nashville and had to take evasive action

Two Southwest Airlines planes had to evade to avoid a collision in Nashville on Saturday after an air traffic controller instructed a pilot to turn into the path of the other plane.

An American Airlines jet last year collided with An Army Black Hawk helicopter crashed near Washington, D.C., killing all 67 people on board both aircraft. That crash on Jan. 29, 2025, brought attention to mid-air collisions that are rare on commercial flights, where planes are equipped with systems to warn pilots of a potential collision.

Most close calls that occur each year involve small aircraft that do not have these systems, but the Fedearl Aviation Administration could not immediately provide a figure for how many occur annually. There are several crashes each year, usually involving small aircraft. the one which… Incident that killed two people in Arizona in February 2025.

Both of the Southwest pilots involved in this incident over the weekend told air traffic controllers that they received alerts from their collision avoidance systems directing them to take action, with one plane climbing and the other diving to avoid a potential mid-air collision. www.LiveATC.net.

Position data for these two planes shows their flight paths converged after a pilot 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. When the controller recognized the threat and attempted to direct the newly-taken plane to remain below 2,000 feet, the pilot reported that it was already above that level.

According to FlightRadar24, this location data shows that these planes were separated by about 500 feet, with one of them flying directly over the other plane; This fits the official definition of a near-airborne collision. However, it may not be clear exactly how close the planes were until the incident is investigated.

The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating. The pilot of Southwest Flight 507 “received instructions from air traffic control placing the flight into the path of another aircraft departing from a parallel runway. Both flight crews responded to alerts onboard the aircraft,” the agency said.

However, the FAA did not say how close the planes came during the incident, which occurred around 5:30 p.m. Saturday.

Southwest Airlines spokeswoman Lynn Lunsford said high winds at Nashville International Airport prompted the first pilot to take a spin. He said both pilots followed the instructions of the air traffic controller and the onboard collision avoidance systems to avoid colliding with each other.

“Southwest appreciates the professionalism of its pilots and flight crews in responding to the event. Nothing is more important to Southwest than the safety of our customers and employees,” Lunsford said in a statement.