What DOT, NTSB Are Saying About the LaGuardia Crash

Officials held two press conferences on Monday afternoon to provide updates regarding the tragic Sunday night collision between an Air Canada plane and a Port Authority fire truck at LaGuardia Airport in New York.

First, Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy hosted a press conference from the terminal at LaGuardia, flanked by Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Administrator Bryan Bedford, New York Governor Kathy Hochul, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, and Port Authority Executive Director Katherine Garcia.

WATCH LIVE: Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, FAA Administrator Bedford give update on fatal LaGuardia Airport collision https://t.co/yrC5O5SodA
— Fox News (@FoxNews) March 23, 2026

Duffy addressed the assembled press, noting that he had just spoken with President Trump and with Canada's Transport Minister, Steven MacKinnon. He walked through the basic facts of the incident:

The incident involved a CRJ-900 from Montreal, traveling to LaGuardia, operated by Air Canada Express and Jazz Aviation.
It collided with a Port Authority fire truck at approximately 11:45 PM Eastern on Sunday.
There were 72 passengers on the plane and four crew members.
Approximately 40 people were sent to the hospital after the crash; several have since been released.
The two pilots of the aircraft were killed in the crash.
There were two individuals in the fire truck, and they were sent to the hospital after the crash as well.
LaGuardia is a "well-staffed" facility in terms of air traffic controllers. They have a target of 37 ATCs and currently have 33 employed/certified, with seven more in training.

Duffy emphasized that the information they can share at this time is somewhat limited — any information collected will be turned over to the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) to allow them to perform their investigation and prepare their final report, which can sometimes take months, even up to a year. Both the NTSB and FAA are there, conducting the investigation. Transport Canada is also sending a team. Duffy and Bedford were at the crash site earlier today.

Bedford shared that the weather conditions included moderate winds, visibility of roughly four miles, with rainy conditions — mist and fog. A United Airlines plane had an aborted take-off, which is why the fire and rescue crew was deployed. The Air Canada flight was arriving on Runway 4 when the incident took place at the Taxiway Delta intersection. The pilots were both young men.

Garcia noted that it had been over 34 years since they'd had a fatality incident at the airport. Both of the fire truck crew members were taken to Presbyterian Hospital. One is expected to be released this afternoon; the other is being kept overnight for observation. Over 43 people were transported to the hospital following the crash; many have since been released. The airport reopened for passengers at approximately 5:30 AM on Monday; the first flight left shortly after 2:00 PM.

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Hochul and Mamdani each spoke briefly as well. Then Duffy returned to the podium to answer questions. Many of them involved specifics he declined to get into, deferring to the NTSB and their investigation. He did, however, refute the rumor that there was only one controller in the tower at the time of the incident.

NTSB will hold a media briefing today at 6:00 p.m. ET on the March 22 collision involving Air Canada Express Flight 8646 (Jazz Aviation, CRJ-900) and a firefighting vehicle on Runway 4 at LaGuardia Airport. 📍 LaGuardia Airport Terminal B Atrium. Livestream link available here:…
— NTSB Newsroom (@NTSB_Newsroom) March 23, 2026

The NTSB press conference began early Monday evening and was conducted by NTSB Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy. Some of the basic facts shared by Homendy include:

The collision between the CRJ-900 aircraft and the rescue vehicle happened at approximately 11:37 PM Eastern.
The aircraft was operated by Jazz Aviation, doing business as Air Canada Express.
There were 72 passengers and four crew members on board.
There were two firefighters in the rescue vehicle.
The NTSB investigative team began arriving on scene at 3:10 AM; however, some members of the team are still in transit, including the Air Traffic Control specialist, who was (ironically) held up waiting in a TSA line in Houston for three hours until they called and begged to see about getting her to New York.
Today alone, LaGuardia was shut down (due to the accident); there was a ground stop at Newark; and, of course, the Department of Homeland Security remains shut down, causing long TSA lines.
They performed a walking inspection of the scene today; the site commander also had to do a safety walk-through to make sure investigators are safe while on scene — there’s a tremendous amount of debris, from Taxiway Delta and across Runway 4; there are also hazardous materials on the firefighting vehicle.
The plane's tail is on the ground. In order to get to the flight recorders, the Port Authority and emergency responders had to cut a hole in the roof of the plane to retrieve the Cockpit Voice Recorder (CVR) and Flight Data Recorder (FDR); an investigator then drove them back to the lab in D.C. They have confirmed that the CVR is not damaged.
They have asked the FAA for an Airport Surface Detection Equipment (ASDE) replay of the event — this would essentially reflect the display provided to the controller; they will get an ASDE analysis from the FAA tech center that will provide information on whether alerts were generated and other data.
The runway will continue to be closed for some time — there is a lot of debris; they need to go through all of it and determine what needs to be taken back to labs.
They will work with Canada's Transport Safety Board.