coming dangerously close to a collision. at one point, they were just three miles apart. renee marsh has been following this on the close call and the investigators who actually have determined who was responsible. reporter: mid-air over scotland, two 747 jumbo jets carrying up to 1,000 passengers are on a path to collide. and british investigators say it s because the pilots didn t follow the instructions from air traffic control. this is very hard to explain because it appears that two airplanes with two pilots in each airplane, everybody got it wrong initially. the problem started when one plane, jet two, asked the control tower for clearance to climb in altitude. it was cleared. but that put it at the same altitude as another plane, jet one. the two planes were now on a converging path and moving closer by the second. the controller realizing that stepped in to prevent a collision. he gave instructions to the
the left. the conclusion of the british investigators was that each pilot did what the other pilot was instructed to do and the planes turned toward each other. reporter: at their closest point, the two planes were about 3 miles apart horizontally and 100 feet vertically. we got down to the last layers of protection. one pilot saw the other. reporter: the plane s automatic alarms alerted the pilots and they corrected their paths. former faa accident investigator steven wallace says it s rare four pilots get the instructions so wrong. but the safety nets kicked in and that, he says, should give comfort to airline passengers. he adds there hasn t been a collision between u.s. airliners since 1978. well, investigators remain the aa loss for answers as to why four pilots, two in each plane,
investigators say this near collision in the sky was due to pilot error. what they do not know this morning is why these pilots got it so wrong. midair over scotland, two 747 jumbo jets carrying up to 1,000 passengers are on a path to collide. british investigators say it s because the pilots didn t follow the instructions from air traffic control. this is very hard to explain because it appears that two airplanes with two pilots in each airplane, everybody got it wrong initially. reporter: the problems started when one plane, jet two, asked the control tower for clearance to climb in altitude. it was cleared. but that put it at the same altitude as another plane, jet one. the two planes were now on a converging path and moving closer by the second. the controller realizing that stepped in to prevent a collision. he gave instructions to the pilot on the right to go to the right and on the left to go to