Air traffic communications from New York LaGuardia indicate that a departing Endeavor Air MHIRJ CRJ900 was instructed to yield to an aircraft from the same carrier before a collision at a taxiway intersection.
LaGuardia has two parallel taxiways – A and B – which run alongside its runway 13/31. These are connected by a number of links, including one designated taxiway M.
A few minutes before 21:00 on 1 October, an Endeavor Air CRJ900 arriving from Charlotte as flight 5047 landed on runway 4.
It subsequently headed east along taxiway B, with instructions to take taxiway M, according to air-ground communications archived by LiveATC.
Around the same time, another Endeavor CRJ900, bound for Roanoke as flight 5155, was heading in the opposite direction along the parallel taxiway A.
The archived communications indicate it had been told to follow taxiway A to reach taxiway E, then hold short of runway 4, with the added instruction, “at [taxiway M] give way to company”.
Its crew read back the clearance, including the instruction “at Mike, give way to the company”.
But as the outbound flight 5155 travelled along taxiway A, it struck the inbound flight 5047 at the intersection with M, resulting in considerable damage to both jets.
One of the pilots of 5047 contacted ground control, stating: “We need trucks on Mike.”
After a query from the controller, the pilot confirmed the accident.
“We have two CRJs on Mike that have collided,” he stated, subsequently adding: “Their right wing clipped our nose and the cockpit.”
The crew of flight 5155 informed the controller that one occupant had been injured.
Both aircraft were operating services on behalf of Delta Air Lines.
Flight recorder from both aircraft have been retrieved, says the US National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating the collision.
It states that the right wing of flight 5155 and the nose and windscreen of 5047 sustained damage as a result of the accident. The recorders have been transferred to the safety board’s facility in Washington for analysis.
No conclusions over the cause of the collision have been reached, and the role of any radio exchange has yet to be clarified.
