Mishap at LaGuardia forced flight to make 'go-around'

A Delta Air Lines   flight that had been cleared for landing had a close call with a private jet that crossed its runway at LaGuardia Airport, according to the Federal Aviation Administration and other sources.

A Delta flight arriving from Omaha, Nebraska, "performed a go-around" maneuver at around 3:55 p.m. on Oct. 7, after the NetJets private jet departed on an intersecting runway "without air traffic control authorization," the FAA said in a statement.

The FAA did not immediately respond to a question about how serious the incident was, but data from the transponders within each airplane show the closing distance was about 1,000 feet, according to Ian Petchenik, communications director for Flight Radar 24, a flight-tracking site.

Emily Pitchford, a spokeswoman for Delta, said in a statement  "the crew initiated a go-around to ensure safe spacing with a departing aircraft on a nearby runway. The aircraft subsequently landed without incident."

NetJets, an Ohio-based company that sells fractional ownership shares in private business jets, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Audio of tower communications posted online seemed to indicate the NetJets pilot thought he had received takeoff clearance. But afterward an air traffic controller reprimanded him: "I believe you were never cleared for takeoff, sir. You were cleared to line up and wait."

The National Transportation Safety Board is also investigating the incident, according to Sarah Taylor Sulick, a spokeswoman for the agency, although she said it does not plan to publish a report at this time.

The runway incursion comes almost seven months after a landing Air Canada flight crashed into a fire truck that was crossing its runway at LaGuardia in March, killing both pilots and injuring dozens. The NTSB’s preliminary report, issued in April, found there were issues with communication between the tower and the fire truck, and the fire truck was not equipped with a transponder to relay its precise location to the tower.

The Port Authority subsequently said it would install transponders on first responder vehicles at LaGuardia, Kennedy and Newark Liberty airports. On Wednesday, the agency said it has since installed transponders on all emergency aircraft firefighting vehicles, although it will take more time to complete installations on other types of vehicles. It has ordered 700 transponders for all its airports, which will be delivered in phases through the end of 2028, it said in a statement. 

A Newsday investigation earlier this year found there were six reported runway incursions at LaGuardia in 2025, although in most cases pilots had ample time to avoid a collision. Nationally, the runway incursion rate has been trending down in recent years.

A separate Newsday investigation found pilots, air traffic controllers and dispatchers reported 25 midair near-misses over Long Island and Queens between 2019 and 2024.

However, experts point out the risks of air travel have drastically decreased in recent decades and are much lower than other forms of transportation, including driving.

"If you see a little kid — let's say at LaGuardia, Kennedy or Islip — about to get on a flight, that kid is five times as likely to grow up to be president as to perish on the forthcoming flight," Arnold Barnett, a statistics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told Newsday last year.

By Peter Gill

peter.gill@newsday.com