Serious incident to the Airbus A321 registered A40-OXG operated by Salam Air on 30/09/2024 near Muscat (Oman)

Preliminary data based on the notification from the Oman authorities:

Due to weather enroute and in the vicinity, the crew requested for left heading 340 degrees to avoid weather which was approved with a further descent clearance to 8000ft and as number 1 for approach. The aircraft is the only traffic inbound OOMS.Approaching 8000ft, the crew were instructed to descend to 4000ft on own visual terrain clearance. The crew maintained 8000ft till visual, after that the crew commenced descend to 4000ft as they were clearly in visual reference with the terrain. Furthermore, the crew corrected the heading to 355degrees to be further away from the terrain flying in the valley visually and closer to 4000ft. The crew started reducing the speed to green dot to minimize the Rate of Descend . We got an EGPWS caution “terrain ahead” to which we levelled off with Vertical speed 0 even though we were clearly >2000ft AGL away from terrain visually. Flying level at green dot, The EGPWS warning triggered to pull up terrain to which the crew applied the memory items as trained and ATC was advised. Then the crew set climb to above MSA and they requested vectors for ILS 08l.