New inquiry as jumbo jet in air miss

The Civil Aviation Authority last night confirmed that it was investigating another near miss involving Heathrow airport, just 24 hours after a report was published revealing two jets came within seconds of colliding. Wednesday's report detailed how two jets coming into land at the airport last November almost crashed after an air traffic controller issued a wrong instruction.

A CAA spokesman said the latest incident occurred on 3 July as a commercial jumbo and an executive jet came within 300ft of one another over Lambourne in Essex. As the business Gulfstream jet was stacking over Essex waiting to land at Luton it was within 300ft of a Boeing 747 coming into land at Heathrow, a breach of the 1,000ft minimum laid down by aviation authorities.

Robert Farrugia, for the CAA, said a CAA Airprox report was being carried out into the near miss which would be ready in about six months. He stressed that about 80 per cent of near misses did not come close to a collision and said details of the July incident had been released at the time.