After the tragic crash at LaGuardia airport, a lot of uncertainty was left in the air. People were (and still are) quite unsure as to how things happened. But, some headway has been made in the case, as reported by the New York Post.
The deadly crash happened on March 22, where both pilots on the Air Canada flight were tragically killed. The flight, which had just come in from Montreal, was tragically struck by a fire truck.
The whole incident is under serious scrutiny. And, it turns out that one air traffic controller may have left their post to use a "crash phone". A crash phone is a dedicated emergency line inside the tower.
These crash phones may not always be at arm's length for traffic controllers. They may need to leave their console to answer it.
Because of the severity of the incident - this is the airport's first fatal crash in over 30 years - the National Transportation Safety Board is taking serious measures to figure out just what happened and when.
One part of this is checking the layout of the control tower. But, despite this, no conclusions have been made, and the NTSB are still investigating.
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There Are Several Other Leads the NTSB Is Taking
While the air traffic controller possibly stepping away may be one piece of the puzzle, there are also several other factors to consider.
The fact that the plane struck the fire truck head on is particularly concerning. The truck was heading to an emergency on another part of the airfield. NTSB officials are currently looking at whether the truck slipped past a required stop line before coming onto the runway. Another possibility is that the crew missed instructions from air traffic control.
As well as this, weather conditions are also being looked at. Pictures do show that things were pretty foggy on that day, but without conclusive evidence and comparisons NTSB can't be 100% sure how much to factor that into things.
Reported staffing shortages may also have contributed to the tragic accident.
We hope that some light gets shed on this tragic incident soon.
