Two Delta Air Lines regional jets collided at the intersection of two taxiways at LaGuardia Airport in New York, injuring a flight attendant, damaging a cockpit and tearing off part of a wing, the National Transportation Safety Board said Thursday.
The NTSB said it sent a team of 10 investigators to the airport after the collision Wednesday night, and flight recorders have already been recovered from both airplanes and sent to its headquarters for analysis. It wasn’t immediately clear who was at fault, but air traffic control had instructed the Virginia-bound plane “to hold short and yield to the other aircraft” before the collision, the Federal Aviation Administration said in a statement.
An aircraft carrying 32 people was preparing for takeoff to Roanoke, Virginia, when its wing made contact with the fuselage of an aircraft arriving from Charlotte, North Carolina, with 61 people aboard, according to a statement from Delta.
The airline described it as a “low-speed collision.” But it would not provide the planes' exact speeds, saying in a statement that that information is "germane to the open and ongoing investigation.” A passenger video showed one plane moving quite fast when the collision occurred.
A flight attendant was taken to a hospital, according to a statement from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. One of the pilots told the tower that the flight attendant told him she hit her knee when the planes collided, according to audio that www.LiveATC.net posted. There were no reports of passengers injured, the airline said.
“Their right wing clipped our nose and the cockpit. We have damage to our windscreen and ... some of our screens in here,” a pilot said, according to the air traffic control audio.
Images of the damage showed the broken wing on one plane while the other plane's cockpit window was shattered and its nose was deeply gouged in several places.
The plane that had landed “stopped, jerked, and jumped to the right,” passenger William Lusk told ABC. ”Everyone went dead silent. And as everyone went dead silent, the pilot calmly came on and said, ‘Hey, we've been in a crash, everyone remain calm.'"
Close calls like this could add to worries about aviation safety in the wake of recent crashes and near misses including the deadliest plane crash in the United States in decades, when an Army helicopter collided with an airliner preparing to land at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
Former NTSB and FAA crash investigator Jeff Guzzetti said that the ground controller lines up planes on taxiways and directs them where to go, but the pilots are expected to avoid other planes as they move at slow speeds while controllers focus on keeping the runways clear.
“You’re supposed to have situational awareness about where your wings are poking out at and what they could hit as you’re taxiing,” said Guzzetti, who is now an aviation safety consultant. “They (controllers) expect the flight crews to see each other since they’re taxiing at a slow speed. And the controller's main function is to make sure the runway is clear for takeoff and landings.”
Because this happened at night and planes typically turn off their nose lights while taxiing, it may have been more difficult for the pilots to see exactly where the other plane was, Guzzetti said. A plane's taxi lights are on the wings. The landing lights are used to improve visibility and help make sure other pilots can see the plane, but the FAA encourages pilots to be careful not to blind other pilots because landing lights can also impair night vision.
“Delta will work with all relevant authorities to review what occurred as safety of our customers and people comes before all else,” the statement from Delta said. "We apologize to our customers for the experience.”
The Delta Connection aircraft involved in the collision were operated by Endeavor Air. Both are CRJ-900 planes, said the FAA, which is investigating along with the NTSB. The planes can seat 70 to 90 passengers.
LaGuardia Airport is one of 35 major airports where the FAA has installed advanced surface radar systems that help track aircraft and vehicles on the ground and alert controllers to potential conflicts. It wasn't clear what role the system played in this collision.
Guzzetti said he's not sure if that system would have sounded an audible alarm for these planes on a taxiway even though the system would have shown both planes on a display. The primary purpose of the system is to prevent collisions on runways.
The passengers on both planes were provided meals and hotel rooms and rebooked on flights leaving on Thursday.
Associated Press writer Kathy McCormack in Concord, New Hampshire, Hallie Golden in Seattle and Sarah Brumfield in Cockeysville, Maryland, contributed to this story.
FILE - A man waits for a Delta Airlines flight at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in Atlanta on Jan. 7, 2022. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel, File)
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. stocks are sinking Friday as Wall Street gets back to hunting companies that could become losers because of the artificial-intelligence revolution. A surprisingly discouraging update on inflation is also hurting the market, while oil prices climb with worries about tensions between the United States and Iran.
The S&P 500 fell 0.7% and is staggering toward the finish of what would be just its second losing month in the last 10. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 589 points, or 1.2%, as of 10:40 a.m. Eastern time, and the Nasdaq composite was 0.8% lower.
The losses came as investors returned to knocking down software companies and others whose businesses could end up getting supplanted by AI-powered competitors.
Block, the company behind Cash App, Square and other businesses, gave a signal of what AI could do after CEO Jack Dorsey said he was cutting its workforce by nearly half. That’s even though he said 2025 was a strong year for the company, which is sending more cash to shareholders through stock buybacks.
“Intelligence tools have changed what it means to build and run a company,” Dorsey said in a letter to shareholders while announcing Block’s latest profit results. “We’re already seeing it internally. A significantly smaller team, using the tools we’re building, can do more and do it better.”
The co-founder of Twitter also said, “I don’t think we’re early to this realization. I think most companies are late. Within the next year, I believe the majority of companies will reach the same conclusion and make similar structural changes.”
Block is cutting more than 4,000 jobs from its workforce of over 10,000. Its stock jumped 17.8%.
Capable AI tools that can replace humans could also replace entire companies, or at least eat away at their profit margins. Fears about AI disruption have been causing sudden and swift sell-offs for stocks seen as potentially under threat, rolling through industries as different as trucking logistics and legal services.
Salesforce, whose platform helps customers manage their relationships with clients, fell 3.7%. It gave back most of its 4% gain from the day before after reporting a better profit than analysts expected.
A widely followed ETF tracking the software industry, meanwhile, sank 1.9% to bring its loss for the year so far to 23.3%. The pain has also filtered out to private-equity companies that have lent money to software companies, which need to withstand the AI threat to keep repaying their debt. Blue Owl Capital fell 4.2%.
Even the companies currently seeing their revenue and profits soar because of AI-related demand are weakening. Nvidia fell 1.6% and was the heaviest weight on the U.S. stock market, a day after dropping to its worst loss since last spring. That's even though it reported a better profit than analysts expected and forecast more in revenue for the current quarter.
Rival chip companies also fell. Worries are hurting such companies not only about whether their stock prices rose too high in recent years but also whether the huge spending driving their growth can continue. Can big spenders like Amazon and Alphabet make back all their billions of dollars in AI investments through higher productivity and profits in the future?
On the winning side of Wall Street was Netflix, which climbed 8.4% after walking away from its bid to buy Warner Bros. Discovery’s studio and streaming business. That put Skydance-owned Paramount in a position to take over its Hollywood rival.
Paramount Skydance shares jumped 10.2%, while Warner Bros. Discovery fell 1.6%.
Some of the strongest action in financial markets was for oil, where the price for a barrel of benchmark U.S. crude oil rose 2.8% to $67.04. It's the latest swing in the market that's been hit by worries about rising tensions between the United States and Iran over Iran’s nuclear program.
The U.S. military has already gathered a massive fleet of aircraft and warships in the Middle East, and a conflict could disrupt the global flow of oil and drive prices higher.
Brent crude, the international standard, rose 2.7% to $72.73 per barrel.
Also hurting the broad market was a report showing that inflation at the U.S. wholesale level was at 2.9% last month, much higher than the 1.6% that economists expected.
The number was so much worse than expected that it could help persuade the Federal Reserve to hold off longer on its cuts to interest rates. Lower rates would give the economy and prices for investments a boost, but they risk worsening inflation at the same time.
In the bond market, the yield on the 10-year Treasury was at 3.98%. It briefly swiveled higher following the inflation report, but it’s down from its 4.02% level late Thursday. Treasury yields often fall when nervousness is high and investors are moving into investments that are considered safer.
ln stock markets abroad, indexes were mixed in Europe and Asia. South Korea’s Kospi fell 1% from its latest record, and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.9% in two of the world’s larger moves.
AP Business Writers Matt Ott and Elaine Kurtenbach contributed.
Trader John Romolo works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Friday, Feb. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Specialist Thomas McArdle works at his post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Friday, Feb. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
Trader Timothy Nick, left, and Robert Charmak work on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, Friday, Feb. 20, 2026. (AP Photo/Richard Drew)
People walk near an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Thursday, Feb. 26, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
A person stands as a vehicle passes by in front of an electronic stock board showing Japan's Nikkei index at a securities firm Thursday, Feb. 26, 2026, in Tokyo. (AP Photo/Eugene Hoshiko)
A currency trader watches a monitor near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), top center, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top left, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Feb. 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
A currency trader passes by a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), left, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Feb. 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
Currency traders watch monitors near a screen showing the Korea Composite Stock Price Index (KOSPI), top center, and the foreign exchange rate between U.S. dollar and South Korean won, top center left, at the foreign exchange dealing room of the Hana Bank headquarters, in Seoul, South Korea, Friday, Feb. 27, 2026. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)
