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B777 first officer reported deviating left off track on their trans-pacific route to avoid wake turbulence; but failed to ask ATC for approval.
| Attributes | |
| ACN | 1577812 |
| Time | |
| Date | 201809 |
| Local Time Of Day | 1801-2400 |
| Place | |
| Locale Reference | ZAN.ARTCC |
| State Reference | AK |
| Environment | |
| Flight Conditions | VMC |
| Aircraft 1 | |
| Make Model Name | B777-200 |
| Operating Under FAR Part | Part 121 |
| Flight Phase | Cruise |
| Route In Use | Airway A590 |
| Flight Plan | IFR |
| Aircraft 2 | |
| Make Model Name | Commercial Fixed Wing |
| Flight Phase | Cruise |
| Flight Plan | IFR |
| Person 1 | |
| Function | First Officer Pilot Flying |
| Qualification | Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP) |
| Events | |
| Anomaly | Deviation - Procedural Clearance Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Deviation - Track / Heading All Types Inflight Event / Encounter Wake Vortex Encounter |
Narrative:
On A590; after crossing pasro; we noticed an airliner directly above us and started encountering turbulence; which we believed was wake turbulence. In order to avoid the turbulence; we deviated left upwind one mile left of course. In the distraction of discussing where to avoid the turbulence; we failed to ask for clearance to deviate left of course. Control asked us about the deviation via cpdlc; and informed us we needed to ask to deviate left. We took out the offset; and returned to the track (the overtaking airplane was far enough ahead at this point). There were no other airplanes either visually or on TCAS that we were aware of; and we believe no separation issues were caused as a result of our deviation.channelized attention to our position relative to the overtaking aircraft led to a breakdown in contacting ATC.
Original NASA ASRS Text
Title: B777 First Officer reported deviating left off track on their trans-Pacific route to avoid wake turbulence; but failed to ask ATC for approval.
Narrative: On A590; after crossing PASRO; we noticed an airliner directly above us and started encountering turbulence; which we believed was wake turbulence. In order to avoid the turbulence; we deviated left upwind one mile left of course. In the distraction of discussing where to avoid the turbulence; we failed to ask for clearance to deviate left of course. Control asked us about the deviation via CPDLC; and informed us we needed to ask to deviate left. We took out the offset; and returned to the track (the overtaking airplane was far enough ahead at this point). There were no other airplanes either visually or on TCAS that we were aware of; and we believe no separation issues were caused as a result of our deviation.Channelized attention to our position relative to the overtaking aircraft led to a breakdown in contacting ATC.
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.