Description

On 11 March 2005, an Airbus A321-200 operated by British Mediterranean Airways, executed two unstable approaches below applicable minima in a dust storm to land in Khartoum Airport, Sudan. The crew were attempting a third approach when they received information from ATC that visibility was below the minimum required for the approach and they decided to divert to Port Sudan where the A320 landed without further incident.

The Investigation

The official Report of the Serious Incident issued by UK AAIB states:

"[…] Runway 36 was in use but the ILS on this runway was out of service. The commander assessed the weather conditions passed to him by ATC and believed that he was permitted, under his company’s operations policy, to carry out a Managed Non-Precision Approach (MNPA) to Runway 36. This type of approach requires the autopilot to follow an approach path defined by parameters stored in the aircraft’s commercially supplied Flight Management and Guidance System (FMGC) navigation database.