Italy Publishes Final Report on A320 Near-Sea Incident: Takeoff Speeds Never Entered, Jet Fell to About 12.5 Metres Above the Sea
Italy's flight safety agency ANSV has published its final report on the 2025 Catania A320 near-sea incident: an Air Arabia Maroc Airbus A320-214 descended after a night takeoff to just about 12.5 metres (a radio altitude of 41 feet) above the Ionian Sea, narrowly avoiding a crash into the water.
The incident occurred late on September 20, 2025. The aircraft, registration CN-NML, was operating positioning flight MAC991 from Catania in Sicily, Italy, to Amman, Jordan, with only two pilots and four cabin crew aboard and no passengers. It departed runway 08, toward the sea, on a moonless night.
The report found that the crew had not entered the takeoff speeds into the flight management system, and that the captain made nose-down pitch inputs during the initial climb amid a somatogravic illusion, in which acceleration makes the body sense that the aircraft is pitching up excessively. The ground-proximity warning system issued "sink rate" and "pull up" alerts; after the crew recovered, the aircraft levelled at 41 feet above the sea before climbing away and continuing to Amman. Because of the flight's length, the cockpit voice recording had been overwritten.
The report also noted that Catania's control tower is not equipped with a minimum safe altitude warning system, and that the aircraft's flight management system lacked a software update that cautions crews when takeoff speeds have not been entered. ANSV has issued a safety recommendation to the European Union Aviation Safety Agency.
(Source: Italy's ANSV)
Source: Italy's ANSV
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 图：阿拉伯航空摩洛哥公司的空客A320-214同型机（注册号 CN-NMO，资料图，非涉事的 CN-NML 号机）。照片：Anna Zvereva，CC BY-SA 2.0，经 Wikimedia Commons。 / Photo: An Air Arabia Maroc Airbus A320-214 of the same type (registration CN-NMO; file photo, not the incident aircraft CN-NML). Photo by Anna Zvereva, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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