"Blood Everywhere": Air Canada Survivor Recounts 12 Seconds Before Crash

A passenger aboard the Air Canada LaGuardia plane which crashed at New York's LaGuardia Airport late Sunday, killing two pilots and injuring almost 40 others, recalled seeing "blood everywhere" in the 12 seconds before landing, per a report.

Jack Cabot, 22, said the passenger next to him injured their face and blood was gushing from their nose. At such a time, people stepped up to help, sharing coats and wiping blood off with a face mask, he told New York Post. He remembered a British woman comforting a young girl who was travelling alone for the first time. "There's always some humanity. Always people trying their best," he said.

Everything felt ordinary till the "crazy 12 seconds" before the crash", Cabot said. And then there was loud bang and a "really, really hard landing". Though he escaped major injuries, unlike many co-passengers, Cabot suffered from a whiplash and awaits a medical conclusion on whether he suffered a concussion. "It's not every day you get into a plane crash," the flier said.

Cabot told New York Post that a flight attendant who had given him a beer earlier. When the plane crashed, she was hurled 300 feet away from the plane, still strapped in her seat.

The ordeal, he said, won't get in the "way of life" and that he will fly again as soon as he can.

The Bombardier CRJ-900 jet from Montreal was to land at LaGuardia on Sunday night when it collided with a fire engine. The fire truck was crossing the tarmac just before midnight after being given permission to check on another plane that had aborted its takeoff. Before the collision, an air traffic controller can be heard on airport communications frantically telling the fire truck to stop. "Stop, stop, stop, Truck 1. Stop, stop, stop," the transmission said. "Stop, Truck 1."

Roughly 20 minutes later, the controller appears to blame himself. "We were dealing with an emergency earlier," the controller said. "I messed up."

A key for investigators will be examining coordination of the airport's air traffic and ground traffic at the time of the crash, said Mary Schiavo, a former Department of Transportation Inspector General.

The crash shut down LaGuardia - the New York region's third busiest hub - but flights resumed Monday afternoon on one runway and with lengthy delays.The two men in the fire truck were also taken to hospital but officials said Monday they were expected to recover.

The collision was LaGuardia's first fatal accident since 1992.

Located in the borough of Queens, LaGuardia is the third-busiest airport serving New York, handling 32.8 million passengers in 2025, according to port authority figures.

Deadly air crashes in the United States in recent years include a collision between a passenger jet and an army helicopter near Washington in January 2025 that killed 67 people.