Incident Involving a Boeing 737-800 Near Barcelona (SP-ENX)

Overview and Circumstances On 17 June 2017, an incident occurred involving a Boeing 737-800 in the Barcelona Terminal Maneuvering Area (TMA Barcelona, LEBL). The aircraft was operating from Girona (LEGE) and was crewed by a line pilot. The event was classified as an incident with no fatalities, serious injuries, or minor injuries; 174 persons were reported as uninjured. ## Sequence of Events During climb-out after departure from Girona, the flight crew received clearance from air traffic control on 133.025 MHz to climb to flight level 240. Shortly afterward, the same ATC unit issued a further clearance to climb to flight level 300, which the monitoring pilot read back. At flight level 250, ATC informed the crew that their clearance was only to flight level 240. The crew stated that they had received and confirmed the clearance to flight level 300 a few minutes earlier and that ATC had not raised any objection to the readback. ATC then issued a clearance to climb to flight level 260. According to the crew, the controller responded to their explanation with “NO PROBLEM.” ## Investigation and Findings The investigation was supervised by Krzysztof Miłkowski and concluded on 6 November 2018. The investigating entity was the user/operator. The probable cause of the incident was identified as the issuance of an erroneous clearance by ATC. The operator recorded the event in its SMS database and included it in its safety performance indicators. The commission did not issue safety recommendations.