By An ANA Boeing 767 Haneda arrival from Shanghai came dangerously close to a Japan Civil Aviation Bureau (JCAB) flight inspection aircraft Tuesday morning, with the two aircraft separated by approximately 70 feet — roughly 20 meters — during final approach to the airport.
ANA Boeing 767 Haneda Incident: What Happened
The All Nippon Airways 767, inbound from Shanghai, was on final approach to Tokyo Haneda Airport (HND) when it came within 70 feet of the JCAB’s Citation CJ4 flight inspection aircraft. Flight inspection aircraft are used by civil aviation authorities to verify the accuracy and reliability of ground-based navigation aids — meaning the JCAB aircraft would have been operating at low altitude in the vicinity of the airport’s instrument approach systems.
At 70 feet of separation, the incident falls well below the minimum safe distances required under standard air traffic control separation rules, which mandate hundreds of feet of vertical separation and significantly greater horizontal buffers for aircraft in the terminal environment.
Context: Haneda’s Recent Safety Record
Tuesday’s near-miss is a serious development for an airport already under intense scrutiny. In January 2024, Tokyo Haneda was the scene of a fatal runway collision between a Japan Airlines Airbus A350 and a Japan Coast Guard Dash 8, which killed five of the six Coast Guard crew members on board. That accident prompted sweeping reviews of ground movement procedures at the airport.
However, Tuesday’s incident occurred on final approach rather than on the ground, pointing to a separate set of procedural and air traffic control questions. Investigators will likely examine how two aircraft came to occupy such dangerously close proximity in controlled airspace during an active approach sequence.
The JCAB — Japan’s primary civil aviation regulator, equivalent in function to the FAA in the United States or the CAA in the United Kingdom — is both the operator of the inspection aircraft involved and the authority responsible for investigating the incident, a dual role that may raise questions about the independence of any resulting inquiry.
The Boeing 767 is a wide-body twin-engine jet operated by ANA on medium- and long-haul international routes, including services between Japan and mainland China. No details on injuries or aircraft damage have been reported at this stage.
