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Investigators Talk To Plane's Captain In SFO Taxiway Close Call

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal investigators confirmed Monday that an Air Canada jet was descending toward a taxiway holding four other planes rather than the assigned runway and narrowly avoided disaster at San Francisco International Airport.

The National Transportation Safety Board said it interviewed the captain of the Air Canada plane, will talk to the co-pilot Tuesday and finish talking to air traffic controllers by Wednesday.

SFO Air Canada incident
SFO Air Canada incident (CBS)

The NTSB said the Air Canada Airbus A320 was cleared to land on runway 28R but instead lined up its approach for a parallel taxiway, which four other airliners were using to get in position to take off.

The NTSB said the Air Canada jet descended to less than 100 feet above the ground and flew over another plane before aborting the landing on July 7.

Air Canada declined to comment, citing the investigation.

California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones also announced Monday that he wants Air Canada to inform passengers of the results of any investigation into a near-collision and disaster July 7 at San Francisco International Airport.

Jones was a passenger on the plane.

He says in a letter to Air Canada that passengers were not told what was happening, instead, the pilot "made a nonchalant announcement that he had to go around due to traffic at the airport."

In the letter, Jones said the plane "suddenly went into a steep climb and we heard the sound of the plane's jet engines increase significantly" after the initial landing was aborted.

The Air Canada jet, with 140 people on board, was arriving from Toronto. The NTSB statement adds details to the first official description of the close call, a summary released last week by Canadian safety authorities.

Canada's Transportation Safety Board has given the flight data recorder, one of the so-called black boxes from the Air Canada plane, to the NTSB, which is leading the investigation.

The NTSB said it has security-camera video of the late-night incident and will release it in the coming months.

© Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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