The Federal Aviation Administration is investigating after two passenger jets came close to a collision in the skies above Houston earlier this month.
News has just come out about the serious near-miss on May 9, when it appears an air traffic controller's mistake put one aircraft directly in the path of another.
Live air traffic control reports reveal the controller telling United Flight 601, which had just taken off, to turn right, which put it almost directly in the path of Flight 437.
At the closest, the two airliners were about 0.87 miles apart with about 400 vertical feet separating them, officials said.
Urgent calls from an air traffic controller can be heard on LiveATC.net recordings obtained by CNN.
"United 601 stop your turn, stop your climb and stop your turn United 601," the controller says.
Later pilots are heard conferring about what exactly went wrong, with one commenting on how "gnarly" the situation got.
The pilot of United 601 is heard to ask another pilot, "Hey, you know what happened there?"
The other pilot answers, "You all basically crossed directly over the top of each other."
"That's what it looked like from my perspective. I have no idea what was going on over there in the tower. But, you know, it was pretty gnarly looking," said the other pilot.
The pilot of Flight 601 is heard suggesting the problem simply came down to not knowing left from right.
"I'm guessing he was supposed to give us a left turn," says the 601 pilot.
An FAA statement says officials have taken steps to prevent any similar occurrence happening in the future.
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