American Airlines Near Mid Air Collision! BOTH Planes Had "SAME FLIGHT NUMBER!"

Cross posted from https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/74171138

UNBELIEVABLE: American Airlines had two Boeing 737-800s operating as AA2482 — one arriving from Chicago (ORD), while another was preparing to depart Phoenix (PHX) for Chicago. The inbound AA2482 finally touched down at 12:13 AM, more than 90 minutes behind schedule. The outbound AA2482, meanwhile, was already airborne after departing PHX at 11:58 PM. For a period, both aircraft ended up on the same ATC frequency with the same callsign: “American 2482.” The controller says, "I've been working air traffic for 25 years, I've never seen two aircraft pretty much merge with the same callsign." Props to that ATC! So calm and professional! His use of 'arrival' and 'departure' to designate each aircraft was incredibly quick thinking for the controller.