28 SEP: Cathay Pacific has denied that one of its aircraft was involved in a so-called near miss over Hong Kong more than a week ago.
Headline media reports say a Cathay Boeing 777 arriving from New York with 299 passengers and a Dragonair A330 arriving from Taiwan with 284 passengers were forced to take evasive action after collision avoidance warning systems were activated.
The reports say the jets strayed within 2kms of each other after being placed in a holding pattern during bad weather.
A former Hong Kong aviation official told the The Standard newspaper that they came within six seconds of colliding.
But a Cathay spokesman tells a different story, saying there was a loss of separation, but no risk of collision, and at no time was the safety of the flights compromised.
"At the closest, they were one nautical mile apart when abeam from each other, with increasing vertical separation", he said.
Cathay says the incident has been reported to civil aviation authorities and it will co-operate with any investigation.
