Second plane in area during fatal First Air crash: safety board documents

A clearer picture of the last moments of the fatal First Air flight 6560 is emerging in documents from the Transportation Safety Board.

The documents say a second plane was attempting to land at the Resolute, Nunavut, airport on August 20, 2011.

They say military air traffic controllers, who had taken control of the airspace during nearby military exercises, hadn’t yet got their radar system fully functioning.

Nor had the military set up a back-up system for planes to keep a safe distance from each other without the use of radar.

The board says that if the First Air 737 hadn’t crashed into the ground, killing 12 people, there could have been a risk of a mid-air collision.

But the board’s head of air investigations says linking the crash and the presence of the second plane is just speculation at this point.