'It only takes one' — Why a runway collision like LaGuardia could happen in Canada

" block, halt, halt!"

The audio recording from air traffic control moments before Air Canada Flight 8648 collided with a fire truck on the runway at New York's LaGuardia airport is harrowing. The CCTV footage showing the impact — the vehicle striking the side of the jet, which then collided nose-first into the runway, killing both pilots — is difficult to watch.

"Oh, God," a voice can be heard whispering in the background of the video seconds before impact.

Investigators in the U.S. And Canada have cautioned that it is too early to determine a cause and that several safeguards would have had to fail for a disaster of this magnitude to occur.

In aviation safety, this is known as the Swiss Cheese Model, which compares the holes in stacked slices of cheese to weaknesses in different layers of safety defences. The holes rarely all line up. But when they do, an error can pass through.

One of the errors now drawing concern from Canadian aviation safety experts is runway incursions, like the one leading up to the collision at LaGuardia.

The Transportation Safety Board (TSB) has been sounding the alarm on the risk of collision caused by runway incursions — the incorrect presence of a vehicle, person or aircraft on a surface designated for takeoff or landing — since 2010.

Flight simulator recreates final moments before LaGuardia runway crash

Yet since then, the number of reported incursions has nearly doubled, according to data from Nav Canada published by the TSB. Most of these incursions, which you could liken to a car entering an intersection on a red light, are classified as minimal risk.

In other words, just because a car runs a red doesn't necessarily mean anyone gets hit. There may not have been any cross traffic. But, as the TSB notes in its safety watchlist, even a single runway collision can have "disastrous consequences."

"The same risks exist here, in that a vehicle could be cleared to cross a runway that is being used by another aircraft to take off or land."

Nav Canada was not able to further break down those incursions into risk levels. But in previous years, the majority have been minimal risk.

"We are actively focused on reducing the risk of runway incursions and chair the National Runway Safety Team, in collaboration with local teams at airports across the country."

"Although the number of high-risk incursions has remained stable, a single incident is all it takes for the consequences to be catastrophic," he said.

Six of those incursions involved another vehicle or piece of equipment. One, in North Bay, Ont., involved a person. But the majority involved another aircraft. There have already been three reportable runway incursions this year, all of them in February: one in Toronto involving an aircraft, one in Hamilton also involving an aircraft and one in Moncton involving another vehicle or piece of equipment.

While Canada has so far avoided any recent runway collisions due to incursion, there have been some near misses.

One came in September 2025, when an Airbus taking off carrying 122 passengers "during the hours of darkness" nearly collided with a bombardier aircraft conducting a ground test at Toronto's Pearson International Airport.

Air Traffic Control (ATC) witnessed the Bombardier moving toward the runway where the Airbus was taking off, the TSB report says. ATC instructed them to stop, but the Bombardier kept moving toward the runway "until ATC issued an urgent instruction to stop."

This time, the Bombardier stopped, but its nose had moved 35 feet into the runway. The Airbus "became airborne just before meeting the intersection point," the report said.

The TSB investigation in that incident is ongoing.

Canada's role in the LaGuardia crash investigation

In another incident, at Calgary International Airport in October 2023, two ground vehicles inadvertently entered an active runway while an Air Canada Jazz aircraft was accelerating for takeoff. The flight crew saw the vehicles but continued the takeoff, passing about 350 feet above them.

The TSB's investigation report, released last year, found that the ground vehicle driver had misinterpreted instructions from the ground controller.

"Each incursion is a warning on our aviation system. These events, no matter how minor they may seem, demand our attention and must never be normalized," aviation safety expert Marcelo Cabral wrote in a January report for Transport Canada.

The statistics provided by TSB and Nav Canada do not explain the causes of incursion. But, in his report, Cabral wrote that the data shows the leading cause leading to incursions is "communication and the assumption that it has occurred."

"In the busy, high-stakes environment of an airport maneuvering area, assuming understanding is a risk no one can afford," he said.

"Safety is first. It's got to be orderly. But it also has to be expeditious," she said.

"And I think as commercial traffic in particular at busy airports increases, and there's more impetus to get more aircraft up or down quickly to minimize delays and backlogs, then there's more opportunities for these sorts of things to occur."

Among the TSB's recommendations for reducing incursions at Canadian airports is wider use of technologies that improve situational awareness and provide timely alerts. In the U.S., for example, runway status lights turn red in response to traffic, Fox said.

"The risk is in Canada, and more can be done and must be done to prevent a collision," Fox said. "Fortunately, we haven't one, but the numbers are growing and that's not a positive sign."

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Senior Writer & Editor

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