Copa Airlines Passenger Jet and UPS Cargo Plane Collide While Taxiing at Miami Airport

A Copa Airlines passenger jet and a UPS cargo plane collided while taxiing at Miami International Airport. According to Sina Finance, citing ATC.com and Flightradar24, air traffic control recordings showed that the Copa jet was scraped after a UPS Boeing 767 entered its path. A controller said the UPS plane should have yielded to the Copa Boeing 737, which had just arrived from Panama. Asked whether it had hit Copa Flight 427, a UPS pilot said, “We went too far, and then his wing brushed against us.” The collision occurred at around 9 p.m. local time. UPS did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent outside normal business hours. Copa also did not immediately respond to a reporter’s inquiry through its investor relations department. The day before the collision, a technical problem caused the longest nationwide grounding in more than 20 years. Officials blamed data overload that disrupted air traffic control communications and radar systems. FlightAware data showed that, as of 10:40 p.m. New York time on Saturday, more than 6,500 flights to and from the United States, particularly domestic flights, had been canceled, while another 8,200 had been delayed. U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said he would formally ask Congress on Monday to approve $50 billion in emergency funding for a comprehensive overhaul of the U.S. air traffic control system.