Two planes collided on a taxiway at Miami International Airport on Saturday evening – a day after the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) ordered a one-hour nationwide shutdown due to communications problems affecting multiple air traffic control centers.
In a statement, the FAA, run by the Trump administration, said the wingtip of a Copa Airlines Boeing 737 struck the nose of a United Parcel Service Boeing 767 “while the planes were taxiing at Miami International Airport.”
Two people were reportedly slightly injured in the collision and subsequently received medical treatment.
The FAA said it was investigating the matter, which was reported around 9 p.m. local time.
According to the FAA, air traffic controllers had asked the UPS crew to give way to the Copa flight before the collision. “The Copa flight was taxiing to the gate and the UPS flight was taxiing for departure to Bogotá, Colombia,” the FAA said.
A passenger on the Copa flight, Cesar Ferreira, told CNN how screams from those around him alerted him to the emergency.
“We were taxiing after landing at a normal speed when, all of a sudden, I heard the noise around me get louder – followed by a collective scream, then the impact of another plane hitting ours,” Ferreira said. “Inside the cabin, we felt the plane suddenly move sideways. At first, some passengers started to panic, but the Copa crew reacted quickly, forcing everyone to stay seated.”
Copa Airlines said in a statement that it “regrets the disruption this incident may cause to our passengers.”
“The safety of our passengers and crew is our top priority, and we will cooperate with authorities as they investigate,” the airline said.
The airport said flights were being diverted to other taxiways, so airport operations were not affected.
“We are aware of an incident involving one of our aircraft on the ground in Miami,” UPS said in a statement. “Our crew is safe and we are committed to working with authorities to determine what happened. The safety of our employees and the public is our top priority.”
The weekend was marked by thousands of flight delays and cancellations following a four-hour FAA ground shutdown Friday, which the Trump administration said stemmed from routine but botched maintenance to replace old copper lines with fiber optic cables.
Trump administration Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy on Saturday and Sunday blamed the need for maintenance on a lack of funding from Congress — although critics said the White House had not spent the money it was allocated to upgrade the infrastructure supporting the U.S. air transportation system.
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