AN air traffic controller's mistake put two planes with hundreds of passengers on a possible collision course on a runway, an official report said today.

Only prompt action by one of the pilots, who aborted his take-off after reaching more than 100mph, prevented a collision at Manchester Airport.

The controller gave take-off clearance to a MyTravel Airways Airbus A321.

But he "forgot" about this when he cleared a just-landed Ryanair Boeing 737 to cross the runway in front of the Airbus, said the Air Accidents Investigation Branch.

Even after this, procedures that should have made the controller aware of his mistake "were not effective", the report added.

Instead, it needed "prompt action" by the captain of the Airbus, which had 220 passengers, to "effectively remove any risk of a collision".

The Boeing, with 122 passengers, had landed on the morning of February 29 this year. The controller had qualified in 1996 and had been at Manchester since 2000.

He was fully validated in all positions at Manchester and was a training instructor.

The report said that National Air Traffic Services and Manchester air traffic control had already taken "appropriate measures to review, standardise and improve their procedures".