On the verge of shock. Two planes came to rest on the runway at Washington’s Reagan National Airport on Thursday, just a few feet from each other. A “stop, stop!” » from an air traffic controller finally stopped a Southwest plane from cutting off the path of another plane, from JetBlue, which was gaining speed to take off.
The story is taken very seriously by the American aviation regulatory authority (FAA), which announced Thursday that it was opening an investigation. A reconstruction video already allows us to better understand, including the diagram and audio recordings, what happened. And to note that the two aircraft had received authorization to move forward, as the FAA admitted to CNN journalists.
“We are aware of the incident and are working with the FAA to fully understand the circumstances,” Southwest Airlines told CNN. As reported by BFMTV, this is not the first time that an accident has been narrowly avoided on this track, which could be “the busiest in the country”. In March 2023, an airliner on a domestic flight entered the takeoff space of another plane while making a turn. A minor incident, but which illustrates the high concentration of takeoffs at this airport which serves the American capital.