No-Injury Ground Crash Gummed Up Heathrow

A little more than a week ago, British Airways chief Willie Walsh told delegates to the Society of American Travel Writers convention that the airline and British Airports Authority were working to lessen the "Heathrow Hassle." Improvements can't come soon enough. Congestion in the terminals and on the tarmacs and taxiways was underscored yesterday evening (Monday) when two planes collided on the ground. Fortunately, it was more of a tap than a crash, and there were no injuries. However, even a tap between a Boeing 747 (BA's) and an Airbus A340, belonging to SriLankan Airlines, can cause massive delays to an already choked-up airport.

According to preliminary reports of an investigation by the Air Accidents Investigation Branch, Britain's equivalent of the US Transportation Safety Board, it appears that the SriLankan plane was taxiing to a runway while the BA plane was stationary. A British Airways spokesman said, "Our engineers are inspecting the plane and we are continuing to look into the incident." SriLankan Airlines characterized it as "a minor incident involving a British Airways aircraft when taxiing to the runway at Heathrow." If it had been any more than a tap or a brush, the incident could have been a major accident. Both planes were outbound, fully fueled for long flights. The BA aircraft was bound for Singapore with 328 passengers on board, while the Airbus was headed for Colombo with 286 passengers and crew.

A BBC on-line report includes a map of the incident site; scroll down to the bottom of the page to see it.