Southwest Plane Comes Close To Collision In Chicago...

Intro

Even since the beginning of 2025, we have been fed so much information regarding how unsafe air travel is becoming. Frequent flyers understand that January actually set a safety record (VFTW) in terms of aviation, despite the horrific crash of AA on approach to DCA.

Well, there was a close call today at Chicago Midway airport due to a Bombardier Challenger 35 crossing the runway, despite being told to hold short...

The Details

Earlier today, Southwest was operating a flight with the flight number 2504 from Omaha to Chicago Midway when they had to abort the landing at the very last minute. The Southwest 737 was less than a second away from touching down before the flight deck initiated the go-around.

An extremely close call

Supposedly, the ATC had advised the challenger 35 to hold short, but the flight deck decided to cross runway 31C anyway. I will be intrigued to find out going forward how there happened to be such a big miscommunication as this could have ended up in a catastrophe if it weren't for the Southwest pilots.

Which brings me to my next point. Props to the Southwest flight deck here, as they did an exceptional job maneuvering out of this situation. The reaction times of pilots never cease to amaze me, as one second you are thinking that you have lined up perfectly, and a second later you have to make a split decision to go-around. 👏

Final Thoughts

There was a close call today at Chicago Midway when Southwest flight 2504 coming in from Omaha had to go around at the last minute. The flight deck of the Bombardier Challenger 35 crossed the runway after being told to hold short, and thus the flight deck of Southwest had to make a split-second decision. Amazing work flight deck!