Delta CEO says flight crew on Toronto plane that crashed was experienced

TORONTO: Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian said on Wednesday (Feb 19) the pilots of the regional jet that flipped upside down upon landing in Toronto earlier this week were experienced and familiar with flying in wintry conditions.

"There is one level of safety at Delta," Bastian said. "All these pilots train for these conditions."

On Monday, the day of the crash, Toronto Pearson Airport was dealing with high winds and frigid temperatures as airlines attempted to rebound after a major weekend snowstorm.

Bastian called the video of the accident, which injured 21 of the 80 people on board, "horrifying" but praised the actions of the flight crew to quickly evacuate the airplane.

"This is what we train for," Bastian said. "We train for this continuously."

Delta said on Wednesday only one of the 21 passengers remains hospitalised. All of the injured are expected to survive.

The airline said it was offering US$30,000 goodwill payments to all passengers that would not impact their legal rights, including their ability to sue the carrier.

Transportation Safety Board of Canada said in a statement that investigators were conducting interviews and had downloaded data from the recovered black boxes that were being analysed.

Two runways remain closed at Toronto's Pearson Airport, including the busiest runway in the country, with the wreckage of the 16-year-old CRJ900 regional jet made by Canada's Bombardier still on airport grounds.

The aircraft is being prepared for removal from the scene and investigators will examine the runway before the site is cleaned up and released to the airport for a return to operations, TSB said.

The crash reduced capacity at Canada's largest airport which has a limit on departures for its three other operational runways, Pearson duty manager Jake Keating told news channel CP24.

Even after the wreckage is removed, the airport will need to inspect the runway before it can be returned to use, he said.

Toronto Pearson said in a post on X that as of 7am on Wednesday (8pm, Singapore time) about 5 per cent of its departing flights and 6 per cent of its arriving flights have been cancelled.

TSB senior investigator Ken Webster said that following the initial impact on the runway, parts of the CRJ900 aircraft separated and a fire ensued.

In a video showing the plane's descent, the landing appeared flat and did not show the regular "flare" of the jet, where pilots pull the nose up to increase pitch just prior to touchdown, experts said.

Webster echoed other aviation safety officials saying it was too early to tell what happened to Flight 4819 from Minneapolis-St. Paul. Air crashes are usually caused by multiple factors.

Bastian said despite several high-profile incidents, air travel remains safe. "It is the safest form of transportation, period," he said.

The crash in Canada followed other recent crashes in North America. An Army helicopter collided with a CRJ-700 passenger jet in Washington, DC, killing 67 people, while at least seven people died when a medical transport plane crashed in Philadelphia and 10 were killed in a passenger plane crash in Alaska.

Separately, Bastian said he had spoken to U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy and was not concerned by the layoff of several hundred employees at the Federal Aviation Administration, saying they were in "non-critical safety functions".

Bastian said the Trump administration was committed to boosting air traffic controller hiring and improving air traffic technology.