Federal officials are investigating after a Republic Airways jet was forced to abort its takeoff to avoid a collision with a United Airlines plane that was still crossing the runway earlier this month at New York’s LaGuardia Airport.
The two aircraft were taxiing on the same runway on May 6 when the pilot of the Republic Airways jet had to slam on the brakes, FOX Business can confirm.
“An air traffic controller at LaGuardia Airport in New York canceled the takeoff clearance for Republic Airways Flight 4736 because United Airlines Flight 2657 was taxiing on the same runway,” a spokesperson for the FAA told FOX Business.
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The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the incident, which occurred around 12:35 a.m. on May 6.
“Sorry, I thought United had cleared well before that,” the air traffic controller can be heard in tower audio published by ABC News, citing recordings from LiveATC.net.
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The incident happened despite the airport being equipped with an advanced surface radar system known as ASDE-X, which is designed to help prevent close calls by allowing controllers to track planes and vehicles on the ground.
While LaGuardia is among nearly three dozen 35 airports in the U.S. equipped with the ASDE-X tracking system, nearly 500 towered airports still depend on low-tech tools – including binoculars – because of the high cost of the technology.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has said he wants to expand the system to additional airports if Congress signs off on his proposal to overhaul the country’s air traffic control system.
“Decades of neglect have left us with an outdated system that is showing its age,” he said earlier this month. “Building this new system is an economic and national security necessity, and the time to fix it is now.”
However, the technology is still not immune to error as displayed by this incident and several other close calls in recent years.
FOX Business has reached out to Republic Airways and United Airlines for comment.
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