Description

On 11 March 2011, a Boeing 757 being operated by Delta on a scheduled passenger flight from Atlanta to New York La Guardia failed to make the acknowledged frequency change after take off and was also not showing an SSR squawk. Contact was eventually established when the flight crew queried being held at FL100 on the TWR frequency they had previously acknowledged and it became apparent that they had failed to select their transponder from SBY (stand by) prior to take off. The Incident occurred in day Visual Meteorological Conditions (VMC).

Investigation

An Investigation was carried out by the National Transportation Safety Board (USA) (NTSB) using recorded ATC data, interviews with ATC personnel and statements from the pilots involved.

It was found that the First Officer, who had been designated PM, had omitted the action to set the transponder to TA/RA as required in the Operations Manual once the flight had been cleared for pushback or engine start and then omitted the item from the Checklist without the aircraft commander noticing. After take off from runway 27R, the PM had acknowledged the frequency change to TRACON given by TWR but taken no action on it. The RNAV SID was followed as cleared and when, some eight minutes later, the aircraft commander asked ATC if they could expect climb above FL100, it became apparent that they were still on the TWR frequency. The position of the aircraft when eventually positively identified was 20 miles east of the airport, having flown the left hand turn and subsequently established on a north-easterly track required by the SID.