Investigators try to find out how all 76 passengers and 4 crew members aboard Delta Air Strains Flight 4819 survived after their airplane crash-landed at Toronto Pearson Worldwide Airport on Monday.
Regardless of the airplane skidding down the runway at over 100 mph, flipping over and dropping a wing, all 80 individuals onboard walked away with minimal accidents.
ABC Information spoke with aviation specialists who pointed to a few key components that start to elucidate how the passengers survived the crash: the airplane’s touchdown gear, its wing and its fuselage.
Passengers go away a Delta Air Strains CRJ-900 jet after it crashed on touchdown at Toronto Pearson Worldwide Airport in Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, Feb. 17, 2025, in a nonetheless picture from video.
Peter Koukov/by way of Reuters
‘We hit fairly laborious’
The regional jet was a Canadian-built Bombardier CRJ-900. Specialists described the 16-year-old narrow-body airplane as a workhorse airplane for flights between midsized cities.
Delta Flight 4819, touring from Minneapolis to Toronto, was operated by Endeavor Air. Chris Finlayson used to fly that route for Endeavor.
“While you come into land and then you definately roll out, it’s totally straightforward to finish up pulling the nostril a bit of bit too excessive,” Finlayson stated, including that angling the airplane too excessive may cause “movement the place you find yourself driving your important touchdown gear into the runway.”
Brian Erickson, one of many 76 passengers, described experiencing a very laborious touchdown, one thing specialists say may have triggered the collapse of the CRJ-900’s proper touchdown gear.
“Once we hit down, it appeared like we hit fairly laborious. And I believed, ‘OK, it is a fairly tough touchdown, however I’ve had that earlier than.’ After which unexpectedly, the airplane began itemizing and turning to the best,” he stated.
John Nance, an ABC Information aviation analyst who examined video of the touchdown, stated that the angle of the touchdown positioned stress on the best touchdown gear, probably contributing to its collapse.
“The influence on the best important gear has pushed the gear previous its limitations, and within the vernacular, it is pushed the gear up by the wing,” Nance stated.
‘I may truly really feel the warmth’
After the right-side touchdown gear appeared to break down, the airplane’s starboard wing started to scrape the runway and was ripped from the fuselage. Pictures taken after the crash clearly present the best wing cleanly snapped off the fuselage, whereas the best touchdown gear is ripped off the airplane.
Contained in the cabin, passengers described feeling the warmth emanating from a fireplace outdoors the fuselage as they skidded down the runway.
“It was simply extremely quick. There was an enormous firewall down the aspect. I may truly really feel the warmth by the glass,” passenger John Nelson stated.
In accordance with a number of aviation specialists, the split-second lack of the wing – which holds half the jet’s gas – may need helped make sure the structural integrity of the cabin and the security of passengers.
“In case you are truly experiencing such a tough influence that the airplane is crashing, which might have been the case right here, then you definately would need it to snap off, as a result of the choice is that your fuselage would have been structurally the weakest level, by which case it will have crunched and torsioned,” defined Ella Atkins, a Virginia Tech aerospace professor.
‘I used to be hanging by the seat belt’
Because the airplane slowed to a cease, passengers discovered themselves hanging upside-down within the cabin. They had been locked in place due to fashionable seats and belts that may face up to the power of the crash, specialists stated.
“I used to be hanging by the seat belt, that are very sturdy as a result of I am not a bit of fella. And, , all people was serving to their neighbor,” stated Erickson.
The ultimate issue that saved the lives of DL4819’s passengers was seemingly its well-trained crew and the quick response from airport firefighters, specialists stated.
“When you’ve got one thing that’s so irregular and so outdoors of what your psyche can sort of take care of, you go to your foundational data,” defined Finlayson. “And that is what that is what you do as an airline worker, you’ve got a powerful foundational data, in order that means when emergencies occur, you simply go to your intuition, and your instincts are to get individuals out safely.”
Many passengers reported the extreme scent of jet gas within the cabin. Nonetheless, by 2:21 p.m. – lower than 10 minutes after the crash touchdown – each passenger and crew member safely exited the airplane, escaping earlier than the gas reignited.
The Transportation Security Board of Canada is starting to uncover clues about the reason for the crash, although the investigation will seemingly take months to finish.
