New York, USA – Two pilots have died and nine others have been hospitalized after an Air Canada Express jet collided with a Port Authority fire truck on a runway at New York’s LaGuardia Airport late Sunday night.
Okay News reports that the Bombardier CRJ-900 aircraft, operated by Jazz Aviation, was arriving from Montreal with 72 passengers and four crew members on board.
At approximately 11:40 p.m., as the plane was decelerating on Runway 4 at roughly 24 mph, it struck the firefighting vehicle. The emergency truck was reportedly crossing the active runway to respond to a separate incident involving a United Airlines flight.
The violent impact crushed the nose of the aircraft and toppled the fire truck onto its side. While the pilot and co-pilot were tragically killed in the crash, the nine hospitalized individuals include two Port Authority personnel from the fire truck who sustained broken limbs and are currently in stable condition.
Preliminary air traffic control recordings point to a fatal breakdown in ground coordination, with a controller frantically heard commanding the fire truck to stop just moments before the collision.
Following the tragic accident, the Federal Aviation Administration issued a total ground stop, temporarily closing LaGuardia Airport to allow emergency responders to safely evacuate passengers and to facilitate a thorough investigation by the National Transportation Safety Board.
