NASA

As the student began the turn, they spotted nearby traffic to the southeast and the SkyWatch system alerted us to the presence of the same altitude traffic.

With forceful takeover of the controls, immediate full power was commanded and we began to maneuver to avoid contacting the ground and the B737 holding between the runways. Aircraft was on a collision course with the B737’s left wing, which was narrowly avoided after regaining controlled flight by a margin of 20-50 feet from the B737 and 15-30 feet from the ground.

I couldn’t takeoff and have enough vertical clearance over the helicopter, so I applied maximum braking to avoid a head-on collision with the helicopter. Both main tires blew out and I shut down the engine on the runway.

As acting PIC I regret to say it was pilot error that caused the engine failure.

He mentioned that this occurrence had been beneficial to all in the tower because they were training new controllers.

I then thought maybe tower had forgotten about us so I reminded them we were still waiting and they responded with “we will get you out shortly,” so we waited some more.

However, although the tower or involved traffic did not say anything to me, my DPE said what I did was not safe and he would have to fail me on my checkride. I agreed and was just surprised I had made such a silly yet vital mistake.

I had total trust and confidence that the student would continue as instructed on the downwind until the Tower was ready for our base turn. That is not what happened.

At this point I am very frustrated with this guy so I decided to go back to ZZZ where at least I would have tower looking out for me.