Narrative:

Prior to top of descent I briefed the 1st crossing of descent and approach; landing; taxi; and all items on the back of the checklist. 30 miles southwest of clt; ATC turned us eastbound for the base turn on the ILS 36L. The first officer asked to clean up the flight plan (clear arrival fix and sequence the approach fixes in the FMGC) I agreed. My attention was on converging traffic I could see at 2 o'clock on final for 36C or 36R; we were between cloud layers. ATC then cleared us to turn left. 030; 5;000 until lonia and cleared ILS approach runway 36L. We were 25nm out I set the heading to 030 and selected localizer; then I asked the first officer where the traffic went. ATC then called to tell us we appeared to be going thru the 36L localizer. The first officer and I noticed that we had not intercepted yet and responded back what we showed. ATC responded; turn left immediately to re-intercept localizer 36L. I then saw airbus traffic directly overhead.the first officer realized we had ILS 36R in the FMGC; he quickly inserted the ILS 36L; and then reestablished on the 36L localizer. We did not receive a TCAS traffic alert or resolution. The approach controller responded that it was not a problem.after debriefing the event following the flight; we discovered the first officer had altered the secondary flight plan on the downwind leg of the approach. Before departure I had loaded the ILS 18R and I copied the primary flight plan to the secondary flight plan.later enroute the ILS 36L was loaded into the primary flight plan due to a wind change in clt. The ILS 36L was briefed during our approach briefing. I suppose to save time on the downwind leg the first officer made changes to the secondary flight plan removing the arrival to re-sequence the extra fixes on the long approach; but he changed the runway from 18R to 36R. Then during the base to final leg to clean up the flight plan the first officer activated the secondary flight plan since I was on a heading. My attention was accessing the risk of converging traffic at 2 o'clock; though he seemed to be above us. During the time when the unnoticed error occurred we were in a high workload/task saturated period.I had planned to add the extra fixes for the approach during the downwind since they were crossing lonia at 5;000 for 36L; but I saw the first officer busy in the secondary removing the arrival and what I thought was making the necessarily changes. It seemed a bit unusual to use the secondary flight plan for the modification; but thought I might learn something. I did not pay enough attention to detail and noticed his confident fingers were a bit of a blur. I thought I would just let him do the busy work. He had been an excellent first officer and very sharp; and hardworking! That's how I believed it happened.I think sometimes we short cut our flight plan verification when we use the secondary flight plan or think it is okay to use the secondary flight plan - single pilot.1. We should never activate the secondary flight plan during a high task loaded situation2. When a flight plan is cleaned up the pilot flying needs to verify that it is correct!

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A319 flight crew described the circumstances leading up to entering ILS 36R into the FMGC instead of the correct ILS 36L. This resulted in the crew overshooting the 36L localizer and a call from ATC to turn left to intercept.

Narrative: Prior to top of descent I briefed the 1st crossing of descent and approach; landing; taxi; and all items on the back of the checklist. 30 miles southwest of CLT; ATC turned us eastbound for the base turn on the ILS 36L. The FO asked to clean up the flight plan (clear arrival fix and sequence the approach fixes in the FMGC) I agreed. My attention was on converging traffic I could see at 2 o'clock on final for 36C or 36R; we were between cloud layers. ATC then cleared us to turn left. 030; 5;000 until LONIA and cleared ILS approach Runway 36L. We were 25nm out I set the heading to 030 and selected LOC; then I asked the FO where the traffic went. ATC then called to tell us we appeared to be going thru the 36L LOC. The FO and I noticed that we had not intercepted yet and responded back what we showed. ATC responded; turn left immediately to re-intercept LOC 36L. I then saw airbus traffic directly overhead.The FO realized we had ILS 36R in the FMGC; he quickly inserted the ILS 36L; and then reestablished on the 36L LOC. We did not receive a TCAS traffic alert or resolution. The approach controller responded that it was not a problem.After debriefing the event following the flight; we discovered the FO had altered the secondary flight plan on the downwind leg of the approach. Before departure I had loaded the ILS 18R and I copied the primary flight plan to the secondary flight plan.Later enroute the ILS 36L was loaded into the primary flight plan due to a wind change in CLT. The ILS 36L was briefed during our approach briefing. I suppose to save time on the downwind leg the FO made changes to the secondary flight plan removing the arrival to re-sequence the extra fixes on the long approach; but he changed the runway from 18R to 36R. Then during the base to final leg to clean up the flight plan the FO activated the secondary flight plan since I was on a heading. My attention was accessing the risk of converging traffic at 2 o'clock; though he seemed to be above us. During the time when the unnoticed error occurred we were in a high workload/task saturated period.I had planned to add the extra fixes for the approach during the downwind since they were crossing LONIA at 5;000 for 36L; but I saw the FO busy in the secondary removing the arrival and what I thought was making the necessarily changes. It seemed a bit unusual to use the secondary flight plan for the modification; but thought I might learn something. I did not pay enough attention to detail and noticed his confident fingers were a bit of a blur. I thought I would just let him do the busy work. He had been an excellent FO and very sharp; and hardworking! That's how I believed it happened.I think sometimes we short cut our flight plan verification when we use the secondary flight plan or think it is okay to use the secondary flight plan - single pilot.1. We should never activate the secondary flight plan during a high task loaded situation2. When a flight plan is cleaned up the pilot flying needs to verify that it is correct!

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.