- 11 hours ago
Air Canada Express Crash
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00:00Following breaking news this morning at LaGuardia Airport, all flights are canceled after a plane collided with a Port Authority
00:08firetruck.
00:09Now this happened just before midnight. Two pilots were killed. Dozens of other people are injured.
00:15This video from the scene showing the wrecked plane, nose tilted up to the sky. The crash truck is seen
00:21nearby.
00:21A tragedy last night at LaGuardia Airport as Jazz 646 and Air Canada CRJ 900 collides with a firetruck at
00:32LaGuardia Airport on runway 4.
00:35All we know this so far is that both pilots were killed in that collision.
00:41One of the flight attendants was thrown clear of the airplane, at least according to early reports.
00:46The aircraft in question was a CRJ 900 en route from Montreal to LaGuardia.
00:52The incident takes place at about 11.45 at night at LaGuardia.
00:57I'm going to play the ATC audio for you here and I'm going to allow it to play all the
01:02way through.
01:03Usually I stop and make comments. I'm not.
01:06Just a trigger warning. There is a collision here. You know that there's a death coming up.
01:10But I want you to listen to what takes place between the controller and the firetruck and the controller and
01:19the aircraft.
01:20And then I'll give you all the extenuating circumstances because there's a bunch of them.
01:24There's a bunch of things that were taking place behind the scenes that we didn't see listening to this.
01:30We'll come back. We'll circle back and I'll unwrap all of that for you.
01:34But let's listen to what happened just last night at LaGuardia.
01:38Truck wanting company, LaGuardia Tower.
01:40Truck wanting company.
01:42Truck wanting company, LaGuardia Tower. Requesting to cross 4 at Delta.
01:46Truck wanting company, cross 4 at Delta.
01:50Truck wanting company, crossing 4 at Delta.
01:53Frontier 4195 to stop there, please.
01:57Stop, stop, stop, stop. Truck 1, stop, stop, stop.
01:59Stop, truck 1, stop.
02:01Stop, truck 1, stop.
02:08Go 2603, go around.
02:10Rumbly heading 2,000.
02:11Jazz 646.
02:14Jazz 646, let's see you collide with the vehicle.
02:16I know you can't move.
02:17The vehicle is responding to you now.
02:20Jazz 646 is the aircraft that collided with the firetruck.
02:24And this is a rather large firetruck.
02:25And so you can see the pictures of the damage done to the airplane just now.
02:30And it's extensive.
02:32The pilots were apparently killed instantly upon impact.
02:36The early reports are is that the aircraft struck the firetruck at about 30 knots.
02:42That could be accurate.
02:44The ADS-B data is notoriously inaccurate down on the ground.
02:48My guess is they were probably going a little bit faster than that when they struck this truck.
02:52But again, it's a very large truck.
02:54So again, a lot of impact.
02:56And aircraft aren't designed to take an impact like a car or a truck would be.
03:00Now, we don't know of any other fatalities.
03:02There are a number of other injuries, both on the aircraft and I'm assuming in this truck as well.
03:08So what were the extenuating circumstances that went into what was happening last night?
03:13Well, number one is this.
03:15It's the weather.
03:17Weather was not cooperating at LaGuardia last night.
03:19In fact, it was six statute miles of visibility in light rain and mist.
03:24And so think about when you're driving down a road at night.
03:28The poor visibility that you get when it's raining out or it's misty out.
03:32And airport runways are not lit like some freeways are lit.
03:38Sometimes there's lights over top of the freeway that illuminates the pavement in front of you.
03:45That's not the case on a runway.
03:48The runway lights are there to outline the edges of the runway.
03:51And then there's centerline lights, but they're actually embedded in the concrete.
03:55They're there just for the aircraft that's landing to see where the centerline is.
03:58They're not there to illuminate the pavement and everything else around.
04:02So the lights that the aircraft has on are about it in terms of lighting.
04:07A truck like this is going to have the normal rear lights and it's going to have the headlights in
04:13the front.
04:14But sideways, there's not going to be a lot of lights on the side of that truck.
04:18And given the fact that it was probably really poor visibility in the rain,
04:22I don't think the Jazz 646 saw this truck until maybe just the last second.
04:28And I don't think they could have even stopped then because of the wetness of the runway.
04:32The aircraft would slide on that runway.
04:35It would be much more difficult to bring the aircraft to a stop.
04:38The ceiling at LaGuardia last night was 800 to 1400 overcast.
04:42So it was a ragged ceiling, kind of like the waves of clouds that are moving through
04:46when there's a weather system going through.
04:48Broken layer at 800, so that would be the last hard layer at 800.
04:52So this aircraft probably broke out right around 800, 700 feet.
04:58They're looking down the runway, but they might not be able to see that far.
05:01And when they're cleared to land, they haven't cleared the truck onto the runway yet.
05:07The truck is still off the runway.
05:08So as the pilots are looking out, they see a clear runway as much as they can see in the
05:13rain, right?
05:13And they've been cleared to land by the tower.
05:17Now, truck one, which is the main fire truck at LaGuardia, calls as they should
05:21and asks for permission to cross runway four at Delta.
05:25Where is Delta exactly?
05:27Well, let me show you a schematic here of, or a diagram of LaGuardia Airport
05:33and where taxiway at Delta is.
05:35So this is runway four right here at this end, the lower right hand of the diagram
05:41as we're looking at it, Jazz comes in to land on runway four
05:44and taxiway Delta is right here.
05:47It's about, it's between a third and a half of the way down the runway.
05:52It's not far down the runway.
05:53They would have touched down about the 2,000 foot mark on this runway.
05:58They would have been going really fast still at Delta.
06:03They would have expected to take the entirety of the runway to roll out.
06:06And I'm going to talk about runway four at LaGuardia in a minute because it's important.
06:09If you're, if you're ever based in LaGuardia or you're an experienced pilot
06:13that's flown into LaGuardia a lot, you know about runway four
06:17and what I'm going to say when we get to that point.
06:19Now, the visibility was at night.
06:21It was somewhere between that highway I'm describing with all the,
06:24the overhead lights illuminating it and the two lane country road.
06:28That's completely dark.
06:29Think about how kind of nerve wracking that is when you're trying to drive down
06:32a two lane road at night and it's raining.
06:34It's not as bad as that, but it's not as good as a highway with,
06:37with the overhead lights. It's somewhere in between.
06:40So again, the visibility on the part of the truck is limited because they're,
06:45again, they would have to be looking out the right-hand side.
06:47I don't know how many people were in the truck.
06:50Maybe it was only the driver.
06:51Maybe there wasn't anybody in the right-hand seat to look and to clear them.
06:55And again, these aren't experienced pilots in the truck.
06:59These are firemen.
07:00They're not trained to gauge distances of aircraft landing.
07:04And so this aircraft, once it was cleared to land,
07:07might've broken out shortly after that.
07:09And looking down, even if they did look at it,
07:12they're seeing lights out at a distance on a rainy night.
07:15So those lights out at a distance, it's hard to gauge how far away they are.
07:20And they're relying,
07:22they're relying and trusting the tower to clear them onto the runway.
07:27So they're following the protocol that they're supposed to by calling the tower.
07:31Now, here's the other extenuating circumstance.
07:33They were talking on two different frequencies.
07:36The tower is talking to the airplane on one frequency,
07:39and he's talking to the fire truck on another.
07:42And again, this is a big issue in aviation.
07:45Why we're still talking on different frequencies?
07:47Because the tower has not heard that there's an aircraft cleared to land.
07:51He's trusting the tower controller who told him it was cleared across the runway,
07:56that the runway is, in fact, clear.
07:59Jazz, who's landing on short final,
08:01they're almost in the flare when this truck starts to cross the runway.
08:06They're trusting the tower that there's nobody in front of them,
08:09and they might not have seen that fire truck down there at Delta.
08:13And at that point, once they touch down,
08:15it's impossible for them to go around.
08:18Because if they went around and they hit the power,
08:20they'd still need a bunch of runway to lift off again.
08:23It would be well past the truck.
08:24So they've got to stop before Delta, which is impossible.
08:27I can tell you that.
08:28It's not possible on a rainy night to stop before Delta taxiway at LaGuardia.
08:34They're doomed to strike something if it's still on the runway at LaGuardia.
08:38Now, you heard the air traffic controller's voice.
08:41He sees what's happening.
08:43He calls out to the fire truck.
08:45He says, truck one, stop, stop, stop, stop, stop.
08:47But he said truck one real fast.
08:50I'm not sure.
08:51I think he was on the frequency that truck one could hear.
08:54But truck one now is kind of between a rock and a hard place.
08:57They're already on the runway.
08:59And so what do they do?
09:01Can they gun it and get off?
09:03Well, taxiway Delta, as you can see, kind of goes a little bit at an angle.
09:08It's not as straight across.
09:09So they would have to turn a little bit onto runway four to exit onto Delta.
09:15And let's say they hit the gas.
09:18It wasn't enough time to avoid Jazz 646, who's landing now and can't stop on the runway.
09:25And the collision takes place.
09:26Both pilots die in that collision.
09:30Why didn't the tower tell the airplane to go around?
09:33Well, once the airplane, I think once he realized what was going on, the airplane was already touching down.
09:37So, again, air traffic controllers are trained to give airplanes commands.
09:43They would give them commands like go around or a command like takeoff clearance canceled.
09:48And then the crew is trained to know what that means, and they will take the appropriate response.
09:53The communication with vehicles on a runway, fire vehicles, crash vehicles, so forth, is a little more informal.
10:02There are some things that they are trained to say back and forth to each other.
10:05But I've listened to a lot of these conversations over the years, even at LaGuardia.
10:10And it's usually like just stop, just go.
10:12You know, they're not trained to give a command and know how to respond to it.
10:17Now, stop, stop, stop.
10:19That's pretty clear.
10:20But, again, that might not have been the right thing for them to do at that point.
10:23It might have been gun it.
10:24Well, again, the controller is not – he can't tell them to do that either.
10:30At that point, he's just hoping that they're not that far on the runway and somehow the Jazz 646 can
10:36avoid them.
10:37That didn't take place last night.
10:38So, it's not feasible at this point in the flight when the airplane's already touched down to tell the airplane
10:43to go around.
10:44That's why no instructions were given to the airplane.
10:47Why didn't the truck see the plane?
10:49Well, again, it's hard to gauge distances and it's hard to gauge relative motion.
10:56So, if you see lights out in the distance, it could be a large airplane that's a long ways away.
11:03It could be a small airplane that's rather close.
11:06In this case, it was a small airplane that was rather close.
11:09But unless you're trained to look for that – now, most commercial pilots, most military pilots are trained to gauge
11:15distances based on that sort of thing.
11:17It's much more of an art than it is a science.
11:21Trust me on that.
11:22There's just points where you have to be able to either look out over the ground and see where you
11:26think they are or gauge what size airplane they are.
11:29But remember, they haven't been told that this airplane's coming.
11:32So, it's very likely that nobody looked out at all.
11:35That's the problem with the two different frequencies and the poor visibility that was at LaGuardia last night and the
11:43rain-slicked runway.
11:44Now, let me discuss runway 4 because I talked to you about that just a minute ago.
11:49Runway 4 and runway 22 at LaGuardia are interesting.
11:52And the same thing is on the approach end of runway 13.
11:55The rollout end of runway 4 or the approach end of runway 22 is a pier that's built out over
12:03the water.
12:04So, when I was a new pilot at LaGuardia, I had an old captain say to me,
12:10Hey, Steve, pay attention at LaGuardia because when you roll out on runway 4, the last half of that runway
12:16is a pier that's built out over the water.
12:19And it will freeze up.
12:20It'll ice up.
12:21It'll get slick prior to the rest of the runway.
12:24And sometimes, even on a dry day, the rollout end of runway 4 will get slick.
12:30Why?
12:30Because there's moisture underneath of it.
12:32And the moisture is coming up over the top of the runway.
12:35And so, it gets super cool.
12:36Think when you're driving down the road and you see that sign that says,
12:40Bridge freezes before road.
12:42And you kind of scratch your head and you say, what does that mean?
12:44It means that the bridge is going to freeze up before the road surface does.
12:48So, the road surface might be fine, but because there's airflow underneath of the bridge,
12:53and think of the end of runway 4 as a bridge, it's going to freeze up.
12:57It's going to become much slicker and harder to stop.
12:59So, the advice to me back in those days, and the advice to all my buddies and pilots that are
13:04flying in and out of LaGuardia is,
13:06pay attention to the rollout end of runway 4 because it's going to get slick down there.
13:10And if you think you need to honk on the brakes at the last minute,
13:12you might not get the braking action that you think you're going to get.
13:15Now, having said that, they never got close to that.
13:18They never got all the way down there.
13:20Why? Because they struck these guys at Delta.
13:22And like I said, Delta is like a little bit more than a third of the way down runway 4.
13:27Had they gone a little bit farther, they would have been out over that pier,
13:29and then the braking action would have been a factor as well.
13:33So, there's a little bit of discussion or information about what goes on at LaGuardia.
13:38All right.
13:38Now, this is a tragedy on every different level.
13:42We won't know until the preliminary report comes out exactly who is to blame at this,
13:48and there might not even be any blame assessed there at that point.
13:51I'm going to try not to point fingers at anybody.
13:54I'm going to say this is really complicated.
13:55Hats off to the controller who kept his wits about him.
13:59He tells Delta right behind Jazz to go around.
14:03He follows up with another go-around call because they didn't get it the first time.
14:06Again, this is the sort of thing where your heart is pounding.
14:09You can hear his voice elevated as he's talking to Jazz, he's talking to the fire truck, he's talking to
14:15Delta,
14:16and he keeps his wits about him to keep managing the airport because there's other airplanes coming in
14:22while, at the same time, they're busy closing the airport so that they can get the other fire trucks out
14:28there on scene
14:30and hopefully save lives.
14:32And so he keeps his wits about him, but at the same time, there's that nagging thought in the back
14:37of your mind,
14:38did I make a mistake?
14:41Did I blow it?
14:42Well, you know what?
14:43It's just like a football game or something else.
14:45You know what?
14:46You've got to stay in the moment.
14:47Eight seconds ago was eight seconds ago.
14:49Keep your wits about you.
14:50Keep managing the airport.
14:52Don't make a secondary issue out of a primary issue.
14:55And so, again, the tapes will all be pulled.
14:58Everybody will go back and review this.
14:59They'll pull the cockpit voice recorder, find out what the conversation was like in the cockpit.
15:04We don't have any of that information at this point.
15:07All we know is that Jazz was cleared to land.
15:09There was nothing wrong with the aircraft.
15:11They would come in and land normally at LaGuardia.
15:14It looks like they touched down in the normal space that they were allotted to land down,
15:18touched down in.
15:19They're rolling out.
15:20Would they have seen the pickup truck before they landed?
15:23Probably not because that, or not pickup truck, but the fire truck.
15:27Would they have seen that before they landed?
15:29The fire truck probably wasn't even on the runway yet.
15:31And if it was, it would blend in with all the other lights on the runway.
15:35From that distance, you wouldn't be able to tell until you got right up on that fire truck, which they
15:41did.
15:42And, again, if there's any more information that comes out, we'll relay that to you as soon as we get
15:47it here at this channel.
15:49Now, if you're wondering to yourself, gee, it seems like there's been so many incidents recently in aviation, and especially
15:58at LaGuardia.
15:59Well, let's talk about what the facts are.
16:01The last time there was a fatality at LaGuardia was in 1992.
16:06I had just been hired as a pilot by my airline, and that was the first base that I was
16:11assigned to.
16:11I spent most of my career at LaGuardia as a pilot.
16:16But as a brand-new pilot, I was given a lot of advice and a lot of recommendations about LaGuardia.
16:21But three months into getting hired at my airline, there was an accident with U.S. Air.
16:27It was the U.S. Air Flight 406.
16:3127 people were killed.
16:33It was a Fokker F-28.
16:35It was on a takeoff roll on runway 13.
16:38It departed the runway.
16:39It went off over the embankment into Flushing Bay.
16:42It's a miracle that only 27 people were killed.
16:44I'll show you a picture here of the wreckage of that flight, because this is the next day as they're
16:53pulling wreckage out of Flushing Bay.
16:56You can see extensive damage on that aircraft back from 1992.
17:00It's amazing, again, that so few people were killed on that.
17:04The really ironic part of all this was that last night's accident was March 22, 2026.
17:11The last time there was a fatality at LaGuardia was March 22, 1992, exactly 34 years to the day.
17:23That's hard.
17:25That's hard to wrestle with.
17:27But our hearts go out to the captain and the first officer and their families.
17:32There's a lot of people that are really heartbroken tonight over this.
17:36Our prayers here at this channel is that nobody else dies as a result of this accident.
17:41There are several serious injuries as a result of it.
17:45And, again, the investigation will be ongoing to find out exactly what led up to this tragic accident.
17:52But as we know it, weather was a factor last night at LaGuardia.
17:56Two different frequencies talking to two different vehicles, one a fire truck, one an aircraft.
18:02They didn't hear what was going on with the other.
18:05And then that just see-and-avoid doctrine of looking out and seeing what's going on, all of that was
18:10hampered by the rain, the mist, and the low visibility last night at LaGuardia.
18:16The air traffic controller kept his wits about them and kept everything else moving.
18:20But, wow, this is really hard and it's really tragic.
18:23So our prayers go out to their families.
18:25We're going to ask you to do the same.
18:27Please pray for these people.
18:29This is hard stuff for them.
18:31It's as hard as it gets.
18:34Well, now you know.
18:36I'm Captain Steve.
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