Two planes collided on the ground at Los Angeles International Airport Tuesday morning.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qy0S8N0X2is
The incident involved a Delta aircraft and an Air Canada jet, and appeared to be minor, according to footage and witness accounts from the scene. The collision occurred on the taxiway near a gate area at the busy California hub.
Jayson Lowe, CEO of Ascendant Financial Inc., was aboard a different flight that had just landed at LAX when the collision happened. “I was looking out the window as we were taxiing to our arrival gate and a Delta A350 managed to hit a parked Air Canada plane. A parked plane. I cannot stress this enough,” Lowe wrote in a social media post.
He added that “somebody in that Delta cockpit lost spatial awareness near an object roughly the size of a condominium building with wings.”
Footage from the scene showed apparent damage to the Delta plane’s left wing. KTLA’s Rich Prickett, reporting from the airport, described the positioning of the two aircraft based on what was visible. “It would appear that the Delta plane was on the taxiway and the Air Canada plane was here at one of the gates, at least partially,” Prickett said.
“It looks like the winglet of the Delta plane went into the horizontal stabilizer of the Air Canada plane,” he continued.
Whether anyone was injured in the incident remained unclear Tuesday. The collision prompted attention at LAX, one of the nation’s busiest airports, where ground incidents between aircraft periodically draw scrutiny over runway and taxiway safety protocols.
The Federal Aviation Administration typically investigates such ground collisions to determine contributing factors and whether any safety violations occurred. Airlines involved generally conduct their own reviews as well.
Tuesday’s collision came amid heightened attention to airport safety following several recent close calls and runway incidents at major U.S. Airports. Aviation officials have pressed for additional funding and technology upgrades to prevent collisions on congested taxiways and runways.
The Delta A350, a wide-body aircraft used for long-haul international routes, was apparently taxiing when its winglet struck the parked Air Canada plane’s horizontal stabilizer, a critical flight control surface at the rear of the aircraft.