18 injured after plane crashes, flips at Toronto's Pearson airport
Passengers recount being upside down after Monday's Delta Air Lines plane crash
A plane crashed and flipped on its back at Toronto's Pearson International Airport on Monday afternoon, injuring 18 passengers, officials say, following a weekend of heavy snowfall that led to flight delays and cancellations.
All 76 passengers and four crew members on the Delta Air Lines flight from Minneapolis to Toronto were accounted for, said Deborah Flint, president and CEO of the Greater Toronto Airports Authority (GTAA). There were 22 Canadians on board, she added. The other passengers were multinational.
"We are very grateful there was no loss of life and relatively minor injuries," Flint told reporters, adding that the quick response was due to the "heroic" first responders at the airport.
"We are very focused on the care and the concern and the passengers and the crew, some of whom have already been reunified with their friends and their families. Others we have in a comfortable place right here at the airport in an environment where they're getting a lot of care and support from my staff."
In an update on Monday night, the GTAA said 17 injured people were taken to hospital immediately and another was transported later. Delta Air Lines also said in an update on Monday evening that 18 people were injured.
Peter Carlson, a passenger on the Delta plane who was flying to Toronto for a paramedics conference, said in an exclusive interview with CBC News chief correspondent Adrienne Arsenault that the landing was a "forceful" event where all of a sudden everything went sideways.
"The next thing I know, there was kind of a blink, I was upside down and still strapped in," he said.
"It was cement and metal," he added. "The absolute initial feeling is just need to get out of this."
The number of injured has fluctuated in reports since the crash occurred. Earlier, Peel Regional Paramedic Services, which services Mississauga, Ont., where the airport is located just outside Toronto, said 15 passengers in total were hurt, after initially saying it believed eight people had been injured.
Child flown to hospital
Ornge, Ontario's air ambulance service, said earlier Monday that a child was taken to Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children with critical injuries, while a man in his 60s and a woman in her 40s were also taken to Toronto hospitals with critical injuries.
But that wasn't confirmed by Flint, who said the airport operator didn't know how many people were critically hurt.
Three air ambulance helicopters and two critical care land ambulances were dispatched to the scene, Ornge said.
Peel Regional Police Const. Sarah Patten told Reuters that most of the passengers were unharmed, "but we're still trying to make sure so we're still on scene investigating."
Departures and arrivals on the airport's remaining three runways were suspended following the crash landing by the Delta plane, but they resumed as of 5 p.m. ET, Flint told reporters. Two runways will remain closed as the investigation continues.
Flint said Delta Air Lines Flight 4819, operated by subsidiary Endeavor Air, was involved in a "single aircraft accident" upon landing.
Todd Aitken, the GTAA's fire chief, told reporters on Monday night that the runway conditions were dry and there were no crosswinds.
David McNair, a former Transportation Safety Board of Canada investigator, questioned Aitken's comment on the wind, saying the instructions given to pilots just before the landing indicated the crosswind was up to 17 knots. A notice to airmen also mentioned there was snow on the runway.
The airport said earlier in the day that it was expecting a busy day on Monday as airlines tried to catch up after 22 centimetres of snow fell over the weekend, causing a mass of delays and cancellations. More than 130,000 travellers were expected to board about 1,000 flights, it said in a post on Monday morning.
'Everyone on that plane suddenly became very close'
Carlson, the passenger, said after plane flipped, he took off his seat belt, which he left fastened during the landing, then crashed onto the ceiling, which had become the floor.
"What I saw was everyone on that plane suddenly became very close, in terms of how to help one another, how to console one another. That was powerful, but there was definite: 'What now? Who is leading? How do we find ourselves away from this?'"
Carlson said he tried to help a woman and her son get off the plane.
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada said it is sending a team to investigate. The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said on social media that it is assisting with the investigation.
Planes diverted
Other airports were accepting planes diverted from Pearson, including Hamilton International Airport and Montreal's Trudeau International Airport.
Audio recording from Pearson's air traffic control tower shows that the Delta Air Lines flight was cleared to land shortly after 2 p.m. ET and that the tower warned the pilots of a possible air flow "bump" in the glide path from an aircraft in front of it, according to a report from The Canadian Press.
There were no further conversations with the Delta flight until the tower confirmed that a plane had crashed, with air traffic controllers quickly redirecting traffic to accommodate the crash scene.
Audio conversations from ground crews at the airport recorded a burst of commotion from workers at about the same time, with someone yelling at another person to "get off the phone," while another crew member described "a huge emergency."
Several minutes later, air traffic control could be heard in the recording directing a medevac helicopter for landing, noting there are people walking around the aircraft.
"Yeah, we've got it," the medevac responds. "The aircraft ... is upside down and burning."
The Delta plane, a Mitsubishi CRJ-900LR, has capacity for 95 seats and was built by Bombardier Inc., according to an aircraft registration posted on FlightAware, an online flight tracking platform. It has been registered to Delta since January 2010, according to the website.
In an online update posted Monday afternoon, Delta said it was aware of the crash involving Flight 4819, operated by subsidiary Endeavor Air.
"Our primary focus is taking care of those impacted," the update said. "Delta is working to connect with customers travelling from, to or through YYZ who should also monitor the status of their flight via the Fly Delta app."
Federal Transport Minister Anita Anand posted on X, formerly Twitter, that she's closely following the "serious incident."
"Passengers travelling across Canada today are advised to check the status of their flight before going to their airport due to traffic impacts from diverted flights," she said.
Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow posted on X on Monday that she was relieved all passengers and crew were accounted for.
"Thank you to the first responders, crew and airport staff for their quick actions and commitment to keeping everyone safe," she said.
Ontario Liberal Leader Bonnie Crombie, Progressive Conservative Leader Doug Ford, Green Party Leader Mike Schreiner and NDP Leader Marit Stiles all expressed their relief on social media that there were no fatalities.
Situation 'messed up,' passenger in airport says
Barb Fraser, a passenger who wasn't on the plane but was in the airport, said she started her trip home to Vancouver from a gymnastics tournament Sunday morning, but her flight was cancelled because of weather. Then she lost her luggage.
"Have you seen luggage in Terminal 1 and Terminal 4? There is luggage everywhere," she said.
Now on Day 2 of her travels home, she called it an "unfortunate accident on the runway."
"No one is getting any answers yet as far as the situation goes, it's pretty dire, so it's not great," Fraser said, adding the situation is "messed up" and "going to take weeks" for the airport to recover.
Fero Fero, who has been trying to get to a beach in Cuba since earlier Monday, said: "But what's happened has happened, like everyone else we are just trying to survive here, trying to have fun ... it's boring, you have to stay hours here."
But, Fero said, "We have to be thankful for the people who survived."
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With files from Muriel Draaisma, Dale Manucdoc, Lamia Abozaid, Reuters, The Canadian Press