A plane from Minneapolis crashed and flipped on its back when landing at Toronto Pearson International Airport on Monday afternoon. Here’s what we know so far:
What was the flight?
Delta Air Lines Flight 4819 was landing at Pearson airport from Minneapolis just after 2 p.m. ET when the crash occurred. The plane was a Bombardier Canadair Regional Jet with 76 seats operated by Endeavor Air, a regional airline subsidiary of Delta Air Lines based in Minneapolis.
Who was on board?
All 76 passengers and four crew members managed to escape after the plane turned upside down, according to Deborah Flint, president and CEO of the Greater Toronto Airports Authority (GTAA). Of those on board, 22 were Canadian.
How many people were injured?
The number of injured has fluctuated in reports from officials since the crash happened. By Monday evening, the GTAA said 17 people were injured, while Delta Air Lines said 18 people. It is unclear which number is accurate.
Ornge, Ontario’s air ambulance service, said a child was taken to Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children with critical injuries, while a man in his 60s and a woman in her 40s were also taken to Toronto hospitals with critical injuries.
But Flint did not confirm these injuries on Monday, saying the airport operator didn’t know how many people were critically hurt.
How did everyone on board survive?
The survival of everyone on board may have resulted from the durability of the plane’s seats and the way the crash unfolded, said David McNair, a former Transportation Safety Board of Canada investigator.
“The rolling impact, although uncomfortable and unpleasant, is not as bad as having a direct impact somewhere,” he said in an interview on CBC Radio’s Metro Morning on Tuesday.
The National’s Adrienne Arsenault talks to Delta Air Lines passenger Pete Carlson about the moments before, during and after the airplane rolled onto its back.
Their survival is “a credit to the firefighting team at Toronto Pearson, the pilots [and] the aircraft manufacturer,” said John Gradek, an operations and integrated aviation management professor at McGill University, during an interview with Metro Morning on Tuesday.
What caused the crash?
At this time, officials have not provided details on what caused the crash, saying it is under investigation. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is leading that probe, Pearson airport said in a post on X on Monday evening.
The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board also said on social media that it is assisting with the investigation. The GTAA said it will provide an update to media at some point on Tuesday.
Gradek said the investigation will unfold “fairly quickly,” in part because surviving flight crew can speak to investigators. A report can be expected within the next 30 days, with a more detailed report to follow in a year or so, he said.
Audio recording from Pearson’s air traffic control tower shows the flight was cleared to land shortly after 2 p.m. ET and that the tower warned the pilots of a possible air flow “bump” in the glide path from an aircraft in front of it, according to a report from The Canadian Press.
What was the weather like?
Todd Aitken, the GTAA’s fire chief, told reporters on Monday night that the runway conditions were dry and there were no crosswinds.
But McNair said the instructions given to pilots just before the landing indicated the crosswind was up to 17 knots. A notice to airmen also mentioned there was snow on the runway.
Video posted to social media by several passengers show the fraught moments after a plane crashed and flipped on its back at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport on Monday afternoon. ‘I was just in a plane crash. Oh my God,’ says one woman who filmed herself upside down in her airplane seat.
Twenty-two centimetres of snow fell at Pearson airport over the weekend after back-to-back winter storms walloped Toronto. In a post on X before the crash on Monday morning, the airport said crews worked “all weekend to keep the roughly 5 million square metres of airfield clear of snow.”
Is the airport still open?
Yes, it Pearson is still open, “with flights arriving and departing,” according to a post by the airport on X Tuesday morning. But passengers are being urged to check their flight status before arriving at the airport.
Two runways were closed as of Monday night for the crash investigation. It is unclear if they have since reopened.
