Two American Airlines Planes Struck in the Wee Hours of Morning at New York LaGuardia

by Gary Leff

Shortly after 10 p.m. Eastern time two American Airlines aircraft came in next to each other at New York LaGuardia.

  • A Boeing 737-800, a three year old aircraft registration N993NN, was operating as American Airlines flight AA294 from Chicago O’Hare and arrived at gate D5.

  • An Airbus A321, a two year old aircraft registration N930AU, came in from Dallas Fort-Worth as American Airlines flight AA1191 and arrived at gate D7.


New York LaGuardia

After passengers had disembarked, and the airline was moving around aircraft for the night — Saturday morning is a light schedule, LaGuardia’s normal slot controls don’t even apply on Saturdays — American tells me that the Airbus A321 was pushing back from gate D7 and its right wing tip struck the left rear elevator of the 737 at the next gate.

Both aircraft currently show a decision time for return to service early Sunday morning. However neither aircraft is far enough along to have a next flight assigned yet, so the planes could wind up out of service longer (and depending of course on how quickly the airline’s mechanics decide to work).

About Gary Leff

Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel - a topic he has covered since 2002. Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »

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Comments

  1. If the equipment can’t operate, American will call it a weather delay. After all, it was dark when the airplanes collided….

  2. Gary, I’m glad you picked this up, was surprised when nobody else did. I was on AA2226 inbound from DFW, 40 mins late so they initially were going to divert to JFK due to the 12PM closure, however, we made it in at 11:48 after making up tons of time in the air.

    Upon arrival port authority vehicles were everywhere at concourse D and they taxied us to the far side of the field next to a couple of other AA ships then shut down. Captain then came on and said the ramp was closed due to an aircraft that had hit a tug at the gate and it would be at around 40 mins to get a gate. I overheard them talking about getting a bus or something.

    Within about an hour they pushed the second damaged ship back and we taxied in to its place. Frustrating, wish we had actually ended up at JFK. After all that Uber in the garage was a couple hundred people deep and 20+ minute wait after 1AM.

  3. @Sean – yeah I did not see this is any media anywhere. Not a huge story, but these things usually get picked up somewhere. Perhaps no one tweeted it?

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