The two pilots killed in the collision between a passenger jet and a Port Authority fire truck at New York’s LaGuardia Airport late Sunday have been identified as Antoine Forest and Mackenzie Gunther.
The pair have yet to be officially named by authorities, who have said only that both pilots of the Canada Air Express plane died and that they were based in Canada. Their identities were confirmed by Canadian news reports and by a college that one pilot attended.
The Federal Aviation Administration, the National Transportation Safety Board and other agencies are investigating the crash. They will seek to determine how the truck was able to cut across the jet’s path moments after it touched down on the runway.
Here’s what we know about the fatal crash.
At a news conference Tuesday afternoon, NTSB officials released preliminary information gleaned from the final three minutes of the plane’s cockpit voice recorder that showed that the fire truck was cleared to cross the runway 20 seconds before the crash.
At 2 minutes and 22 seconds, the flight crew checked in with the tower at LaGuardia, said Doug Brazy, NTSB’s senior aviation investigator.
At 2 minutes and 17 seconds, the tower cleared the airplane to land on Runway 4.
Brazy said that at 1 minute and 3 seconds, an airport vehicle made a radio transmission to the tower but that the transmission was “stepped on” by another radio transmission. NTSB Chairwoman Jennifer Homendy said that means there was some sort of interference with the transmission.
At 54 seconds, the tower advised the flight crew that the plane was at a stable approach, Brazy said.
At 40 seconds, the LaGuardia tower asked which vehicle needed to cross a runway. Brazy said the fire truck made a transmission to the tower, which the tower acknowledged. At 25 seconds, the truck requested permission to cross Runway 4. Brazy said that at 20 seconds, the tower cleared the truck to cross.
At 17 seconds, the fire truck read back the runway crossing clearance, he said. According to Brazy, the tower instructed a Frontier Airlines flight to hold position, and at 9 seconds, the tower told the fire truck to stop.
At 8 seconds, there was a sound consistent with the airplane’s landing gear touching down on the runway, he said. At 6 seconds, there was a pilot transfer of controls. Homendy told reporters that the first officer was flying the plane and transferred control to the captain.
At 4 seconds, the tower again instructed the fire truck to stop, Brazy said.