Delta Planes Collide On Atlanta Tarmac, Nearly Severing One Plane’s Tail

Two Delta planes collided on the taxiway at Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport on Tuesday morning, leaving one of the planes on the tarmac with a nearly severed tail, photos show.

Both aircraft were preparing to take off just after 10 a.m. when the wing of the larger plane, an Airbus A350 heading to Tokyo, struck the tail of a CRJ-900 jet heading to Lafayette, Louisiana, Delta said in a statement.

Video and photos posted to social media show the tail of the smaller plane ― operated by Endeavor Air, a subsidiary of Delta ― folded over at a 90-degree angle.

No injuries were reported, though a total of 277 customers between both planes had to be transported back to the terminal and rebooked on different flights, the airline said.

The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board both said they are investigating the incident, with an NTSB spokesperson telling HuffPost that the agency will release additional information once it becomes available.

Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport has been consistently ranked the world’s busiest for passenger volume, with 104.7 million passengers streaming through it in 2023, according to Airports Council International’s latest data report. It also had the greatest number of takeoffs and landings, per ACI, with 776,000 planes moving across its runways last year, or roughly 2,126 planes a day.