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With the holiday travel season under way, the Federal Aviation Administration is reviewing another near mid-air collision near Chicago.  This is the second near mid-air collision in just a week, the other occurring over Indiana. 

The planes traveling over central Wisconsin came within 2.8 lateral miles and 500 vertical feet from each other. 
View Larger MapThe 7110.65R (the Air Traffic Control book of rules and regulations) in section 5-5-4 requires that planes 40 miles from the antenna to be separated by 5 miles or more. 

"We were not talking to either airplane.  This was really a bad situation,” said Jeffrey Richards, president of the controllers' union at the Federal Aviation Administration's Chicago Center in suburban Aurora. 

A Cessna Caravan 208 turboprop, had taken off from Chicago's Midway Airport and was traveling to Leeward Farm, a private airport in Soldiers Grove, Wis. The second plane, a Cirrus SR-22, had just departed from the Tri-County Regional Airport near Lone Rock, Wisconsin.

FAA spokesman Tony Molinaro downplayed a connection between the two near misses and noted that overall errors at the Aurora facility have been decreasing since 2003.  Chicago Center handles roughly 3 million flights a year. 

KSDK.com 

ATC Regulation 5-5-4