A Virgin Australia plane was directed to take last minute evasive action while coming into land at Gold Coast airport Sunday morning to avoid a light aircraft.

Beachgoers at Bilinga watched in amazement as the Boeing 737 flying in from Sydney took a sharp turn just as it was about to land about 9:15 a.m. AEST, at the same time as a tiny Cessna appeared in view.

One beachgoer who didn't want his name used, said from the beach it looked like the two aircraft came within 200m of the other.

"We were here for our first morning of nippers and (the near miss) was the talk of the beach," he said.

"It was pretty incredible to see."

Flight radar images show the Virgin Australia aircraft flying into land and then turning sharply at the last moment as a small aircraft takes off from Coolangatta.

The Virgin flight then performed a loop before landing without incident behind a Qantas aircraft.

No flight report was lodged by the pilot at the Gold Coast.

A Virgin Australia spokesman confirmed the flight from Sydney was directed to complete a "go around procedure" because an aircraft on the runway was taking long than expected to take-off.

"The aircraft completed the manouvre and landed ahead of schedule," he said.

Boeing 737-800s generally carry up to 189 passengers.

An Air Services Australia spokeswoman confirmed the incident was not as serious as it may have appeared.

"They were potentially going to come a little bit too close so a procedural assurance was given," said the spokeswoman.

"There was never any danger to anyone and no loss of separation."

She said loss of separation assurances were commonplace in Australian aviation and generally of no concern.

Australian Transport Safety Bureau statistics show in the year to September 12, 4,337 loss of separation assurances were issued, of which 176 were classified as "serious incidents".

Gold Coast Airport is the sixth busiest terminal in the country, with around half a million passenger movements a month.