It was a routine arrival from Honolulu that nearly turned disastrous over Long Beach. A Hawaiian Airlines A321neo and a small Cessna 172 came dangerously close to colliding in 2023, according to a National Transportation Safety Board report released this week. The two aircraft, one inbound from Hawaii and one coming from Santa Barbara, crossed flight paths at the intersection of two active runways just moments before landing.
What happened.
The incident occurred on October 26, 2023, when Hawaiian Airlines Flight 70 from Honolulu was cleared to land on runway 30 at Long Beach. At almost the same time, a private Cessna 172 was cleared to land on runway 26L, which crosses runway 30.
In theory, a staggered operation of this kind is safe when timing and communication are tightly managed. But according to the NTSB’s final report, both planes ended up over the same point at nearly the exact moment. The Cessna turned late on its final leg, while the A321 was already established on its final approach. The two aircraft passed in close proximity over the runway intersection before both landing safely.
The human factor.
Investigators say the cause was not due to weather, equipment, or visibility. Instead, it was an ATC distraction. The tower’s local controller had been assigned three jobs at once: local control, local assist, and ground control. As the Hawaiian flight and the Cessna approached from different directions, the controller was simultaneously fielding radio calls from aircraft on the ground requesting gate pushback and was on the phone with the FAA’s Traffic Management Unit to clear a flight departure.
The NTSB described it as a breakdown in task prioritization. The controller, overwhelmed by the simultaneous responsibilities, lost situational awareness of the arriving aircraft. This lapse violated the FAA’s air traffic control handbook, which instructs controllers to prioritize airborne separation above all else.
Oversight failure compounded the risk.
The Controller-in-Charge at the Long Beach tower later admitted he should have handled the phone coordination himself so the working controller could focus on live traffic. He also failed to monitor radio frequencies as required by local standard operating procedures. The NTSB found that the “ineffective oversight” directly contributed to the near collision…