Solange Tremblay, the flight attendant on the plane that crashed at LaGuardia Airport, had been seated RIGHT BEHIND the pilots when the tragedy

“It tried taking off twice and both times literally stopped in its tracks,” she said, explaining that after two and a half hours on board, passengers were told they had to evacuate. She added, “They said there was a smell coming from the plane. I don’t know if that was just something they were saying.”

After returning to the terminal, Rojas said she saw emergency vehicles everywhere and only later learned about the crash online. She was first rebooked for a 7:00 a.m. flight that was also canceled, then placed on a 3:20 p.m. departure, but said security was closed and she had no way to check her bags.

By that point, she had been waiting at the airport for 12 hours, hoping to finally get home. Reflecting on the crash, she said, “It’s scary. You never know if it could have been one of us.”

That context made the audio even harder to hear. A fast-moving but controlled emergency response ended up with a runway shut down, lives lost, people injured and scared, an airport plunged into chaos, and a recording that now serves as a minute-by-minute account of how everything went wrong.

Pattern of Close Calls and near Misses

The crash followed a series of recent incidents and near misses in the region, according to CNN.

In October 2025, two Delta regional jets collided on a LaGuardia taxiway, sending one person to the hospital. More recently, a close call in Newark involved two aircraft attempting to land on intersecting runways.

Over the past two years, multiple reports have described narrowly avoided collisions at LaGuardia.

Many of these accounts cite confusion or miscommunication involving air traffic control and were submitted through a voluntary reporting system used by aviation personnel.

One report from December 2024 described how a plane came dangerously close to another aircraft on the ground after receiving incorrect instructions.