A FLYING safety review is under way following a report into a near-miss between an RAF Tornado and a passenger aircraft.

The RAF jet came within 300ft of the charter plane as it approached Newcastle airport, with neither pilot having enough time to take avoiding action.

Now, a report by the Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) has called for a new look at the issue of safety in uncontrolled airspace as a result of the incident.

The Tornado, from RAF Leuchars in Scotland, was one of 32 jets taking part in a night-flying exercise in March last year.

It was flying at 5,000ft when it came within 100ft vertically and 300ft horizontally of a Gill Airways' Shorts aircraft, carrying 11 passengers from Aberdeen, 26 miles north of Newcastle airport.

The report said a controller issued information to help the Shorts pilot avoid the Tornado, but the RAF jet's speed and unpredictable manoeuvres made this ineffective.

It added that the Shorts pilot acknowledged the instruction "and almost immediately transmitted an expletive followed by the words air-miss".

The report said the pilot had not seen the Tornado until the near-miss had occurred, and the Tornado crew had been only momentarily aware of it prior to the event through their on-board radar.

Both aircraft were in an area of uncontrolled airspace, where pilots receive information from controllers, but are responsible themselves for avoiding other aircraft.

The AAIB recommended that the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) and the Ministry of Defence (MoD) should look at the issue of safety in uncontrolled airspace as a result of the incident.

A CAA spokesman said they were complying with the recommendation.

An MoD spokesman said they were considering the report's recommendations. He said: "Night-flying is something we have to undertake and safety is always a primary concern for us. If there are lessons to be learned from what happened in this incident, then we will learn them."

The near-miss was one of 87 reported between January 1990 and March 2000 involving military aircraft and commercial planes in uncontrolled airspace below 10,000ft