WASHINGTON — Two air traffic controllers stepped away early from their posts at New York City’s LaGuardia Airport in March, leaving the tower short-staffed before a jet collided with a fire truck, killing two people, according to two people familiar with the matter.

The Federal Aviation Administration is taking steps to fire the controllers, the people said, adding that the agency is looking into a wider range of time-card irregularities at air traffic control facilities across the country. The Wall Street Journal first reported the news Thursday. Early departures that are not recorded as such, called “shoves,” are considered a form of time-card fraud.

In response to a request for comment, the Department of Transportation provided a statement from Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy.

“We will not tolerate fraud, and we are taking appropriate action to hold folks accountable and prevent unlawful practices from disrupting the traveling public,” Duffy said, adding that such actions “take advantage of the American taxpayer, unfairly add additional work to their fellow controllers and impact the airspace.”

According to the National Transportation Safety Board, there were only two controllers in the tower at 11:37 p.m. March 22, when a landing Air Canada jet careened into a fire truck that had been given clearance to cross the runway. But investigators said early on in their probe that it was unclear if other controllers had been present elsewhere in the tower, raising questions about whether official records correctly reflected staffing levels that night.

It is common practice at midsize airports like LaGuardia for two people to work a shift overnight, when runway traffic is usually light. But on the night of the accident, the airport tower was especially busy, because rain and thunderstorms had delayed several arrivals and departures throughout the day, pushing them to the overnight shift.

A review of flights in and out of LaGuardia compiled by tracking website FlightRadar24 revealed that after 11 p.m., the rate of takeoffs and landings was roughly the same as what controllers had been handling throughout the evening.

A spokesperson for the National Air Traffic Controllers Association did not answer specific questions on the staffing protocols or if the FAA planned to discipline the controllers.

“NATCA is actively discussing these allegations with FAA leadership,” an emailed statement reads. “We believe those discussions are the appropriate forum for addressing the matter.”

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Karoun Demirjian/Dakota Santiago
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