The Region : Airliner and Small Plane Nearly Collide

A PSA flight from Burbank to San Francisco, carrying 76 passengers and five crew members, came within 200 feet of colliding with a light aircraft. Capt. Paul Wenhe said he quickly banked right to avoid colliding with an unidentified Cherokee single-engine aircraft, which converged with the DC-9 at an altitude of 8,000 feet. He said the two planes came within 200 feet of each other. The incident, which will be reported to the Federal Aviation Administration as a “near miss,” occurred four minutes after takeoff just northwest of the airport. Wenhe said the Cherokee was not being guided by air traffic controllers because the weather was good and the plane was outside the terminal control area.