A ground worker got an almighty shock when the pilots of a Jetstar plane fired up its engines to taxi to the runway at Newcastle Airport, while the worker remained connected to the A320's nose.
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In what air-safety investigators have described as a "serious incident", the dispatcher had been been walking beside the aircraft as it was pushed back from in front of the airport's terminal, linked by a headset to allow communication with the pilots.
It was after the pushback that the attention of the Jetstar pilots was diverted to monitoring a plane in a neighbouring bay that had requested clearance to taxi to the runway.
The Jetstar plane's captain was concerned that there was not enough room for the other aircraft to turn around without hitting the A320 carrying 165 passengers and six crew.
A report by the Australian Transport Safety Bureau into the incident on January 25 reveals that it was while the Jetstar pilots were monitoring the situation that they mistook another dispatcher, who had disconnected from the neighbouring plane that posed a risk to theirs, for their own.
Moments later, the Jetstar pilots requested and received clearance to taxi for departure for the flight to Brisbane, turning their lights on, releasing their brakes and increasing power while their dispatcher was still connected to their plane.
Their dispatcher had been waiting below for the pilots to give the OK to disconnect the line used for communication.
"[The dispatcher] observed the taxi lights for [the Jetstar A320] illuminate, then they heard the engine noise increase, and then the aircraft started to taxi," the report said.
Shocked at what was happening, the dispatcher immediately disconnected the headset and rushed clear of the jet aircraft towards the airport's terminal as it began taxiing to the runway for a flight to Brisbane.
In their report, the investigators said the Jetstar captain "reported their their most important lesson was distraction management".
The captain believed that slowing down the check-list procedure the pilots carry out was the most practical way of reducing the risk of such incidents occurring again.
It is the second report pertaining to aircraft at Williamtown in as many months.
The safety authority in April reported on a Pelican Airlines plane that was forced to turn around minutes out of Newcastle Airport after an engine failed.
The investigation discovered the aircraft had been in storage between 2007 and 2016 before undergoing “major maintenance” and was released to service 11 days before the morning of the December 14 incident.