Capt Neil Roberts ambled slowly towards his aircraft 4R-AJL, a turboprop aircraft, sitting on Bay-5 in the Katunayake International Airport, Srilanka, waiting for departure on its scheduled flight UL-207. First Officer William had already gone to the aircraft and the aircraft was now boarding. The weather was clear with blue sky and there was no forecast for any adverse weather conditions enroute.

Capt Neil, boarded the aircraft, said hello to the chief cabin executive and entered the cockpit and positioned himself. First officer williams had already prepared the cockpit for departure.

With formal exchange of greetings, Capt.Neil called up ATC for Start up and taxi clearance.

ATC Colombo cleared UL207 to start up and cleared the aircraft to taxi out to the active runway 04, enter the runway and line up.

Capt UL207 taxiied to runway. Called up ATC

Tower UL207 Request ATC departure instructions

UL207 copy ATC Colombo clears UL207- Colombo to Trichy- Via Flight Plan Route- To cruise and maintain FL 160 Departure after take off Runway 04- Turn left, intercept radial 345 and climb to cruising level unrestricted.

Roger-Copied Request Take off

UL207 Cleared for Take off- surface wind 050 degrees 06 Knots

Roger Rolling

UL207 made a smooth take off, slowly turned left while climbing and set course., towards its destination.

Mr.Kenneth George was on morning duty in ATC control- Trichy. With two departures already gone, the only arrival was UL207 from Colombo, expected at 1030hrs.

Capt Neil was 75 miles out of Trichy and called up. Mr.George heard his call and responded to the aircraft and passed local weather to pilot.

AT 1020hrs Capt Neil called up ATC Trichy: Trichy Tower- UL 207- I have your field in sight- Request permission for a straight in approach for Runway 27.

George cleared the aircraft for straight in approach and advised the aircraft to report finals UL207 agreed

At 1023, UL207 reported finals for Runway 27. Mr.George, who was looking somewhere else through his binoculars, cleared the aircraft to land.

UL207 you are cleared to land- Surface wind 290 deg 04knts.

Capt.Neil Roberts, was in fact, was on finals to a disused second world war aerodrome, near Tanjore, 15 miles East of Trichy, Not knowing the wrong approach, he made a smooth landing on the disused runway. And cut his speed. There was something seriously wrong he thought. There were no Crash Fire Tenders and no ATC building at all ! He realised now that he had landed at the wrong airport !

Mr.George called up UL207 for taxi clearance, but to his horror found that there was no aircraft ! What happened ? Has he crashed ? He gave numerous calls- No answer !

Meantime, Neil quietly backtracked on the runway to the beginning and took off again- As the aircraft was speeding down the runway on take off roll, he saw a man standing near the building and watching the aircraft !

As he climbed, he gave a call to ATC Trichy. George felt greatly relieved. The aircraft reported for finals again within 5 minutes and landed at Trichy.

After blaming each other for lapses, both the controller and the pilot decided to push the case under the carpet.

Exactly, after one month, Mr.George got a letter from his headquarters- to explain the reasons for not submitting an incident report into the case of wrong approach and landing and the reasons ! The man in the disused airport, who was the care taker, made a complaint to Headquarters that an aircraft with registration 4R AGL, made a landing but took off without paying landing charges. The time and date along with the registration let the cat out of the bag !