What Is a Go-Around, and Why Is It Routine?

A few hundred feet above the runway, the engines spool up, the nose rises, and instead of touching down the aircraft climbs away for another try. For a passenger with no context, it can feel alarming: the one moment in a routine flight that visibly doesn’t go to plan. For the crew, it’s one of the most practised and least dramatic manoeuvres of the flight. They brief it before every approach, whether they need it or not.

A real example most flyers never see up close

A February 2025 go-around at Washington Reagan National drew wide press coverage. On 25 February, American Airlines Flight 2246 from Boston broke off its landing at air traffic control’s direction to keep a safe gap from a jet departing from the same runway. It was exactly the kind of quick, precautionary call the manoeuvre exists for. CNN’s coverage explained why it worked as designed. A conflict was developing, the call came at once, and a possible problem became a non-event. The airline said the flight then landed safely and normally.

Why it actually happens

Among the most common triggers, and it isn’t weather or a mechanical problem at all, is spacing between aircraft. Air traffic control sometimes lines up a faster, heavier aircraft too close behind a slower one, and the one behind can’t keep a safe gap all the way to touchdown. Going around resets the sequence instead of forcing the gap to close unsafely. Another frequent cause is what pilots call an unstabilised approach. The aircraft arrives too high, too fast, or not properly set up, with gear, flaps and speed outside a defined window, at the point where the airline’s rules say it must already be stable. Rather than rescue a rushed approach in the last few seconds, the crew goes around and sets up properly for another try. Other causes include a runway still occupied by the aircraft before, an animal or vehicle on the runway, another aircraft or vehicle in the way (as at Reagan National), and real wind shear or gusts.

What “stabilized” actually means

Airlines define a stabilised approach with hard numbers, not a feeling. By a set height on final approach, commonly 1,000 feet in poor weather and 500 feet in clear conditions, the aircraft must be on the right path and at the right approach speed, within a narrow margin. It must be set up to land, with gear down and flaps set, and descending no faster than the limit. If any one of those isn’t met at that height, the approach is unstabilised by definition. At almost every major airline, the rules then require a go-around. It isn’t a judgment call about whether the approach still feels rescuable.

The real risk is the opposite of what most passengers assume

The safety data runs against instinct. Go-arounds don’t cause accidents; reluctance to call one does. Continuing an unstabilised approach to the runway is one of the leading factors in landing accidents worldwide. Research suggests crews go around on only a small share, an estimated 3%, of the unstable approaches that should trigger one under their own airline’s rules. Aviation educators who analyse incidents in depth, such as Mentour Pilot, whose channel is built largely on breaking down real flights, keep coming back to this pattern. The manoeuvre that looks most dramatic to passengers is, by the numbers, the safest response to a bad approach. Every airline pilot drills the decision in the simulator so it never has to be reasoned out in real time, only recognised and carried out.

Sources & Further Reading

• What Is a Go-Around? — CNN ↗
• How Often Do Airliners Go Around? — Flying Mag ↗
• The Last Few Seconds: Go-Arounds and Why They Happen — Airways Mag ↗