NTSB investigators arrived at Newark Liberty International Airport on Monday after a United jet from Venice, Italy, clipped a light pole and damaged a tractor-trailer on the New Jersey Turnpike during a landing attempt the day before. United Flight 169 was coming in around 2 p.m. Sunday when it flew too close to traffic on final approach, leaving debris across the roadway and sending the truck driver to the hospital with cuts from shattered glass.
The Boeing 767 carried 221 passengers and 10 crew members, and everyone on board was unharmed. The truck driver, who was working for H&S Family of Bakeries, was seen on video continuing down the turnpike as the impact unfolded, then pulling over safely after the cab was punctured and the windshield shattered but not destroyed. The pole that was struck then hit a Jeep also traveling on the roadway.
Exclusive photos showed the damage in stark terms: a punctured hole in the truck’s cab and a windshield broken by flying debris. It was still not clear on Monday whether the light pole or the plane’s tire struck the truck. The NTSB said the event was classified as an accident because of the extent of damage to the airplane, a designation that triggers a formal investigation and a closer look at what happened in the final seconds before touchdown.
That investigation is now centered on the flight crew, weather, air traffic control, airline operations and human performance. New Jersey State Police said in a preliminary account that a landing tire and the underside of the plane struck a pole and the top of the tractor-trailer. The NTSB was on the ground Monday at Newark to interview the crew, while United Airlines said the team had been removed from service as part of what it called a rigorous flight safety investigation.
United said, in effect, that the case will be handled as a full review rather than a quick explanation. U.S. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy called the event unacceptable and said it should never happen in America. Former Navy pilot and aviation analyst Steve Ganyard said, “This aircraft was literally inches from disaster,” and added, “Clearly, we saw [the crew] fighting that altitude as they come in.” The unanswered question is no longer whether the plane landed safely — it did — but how a Boeing 767 carrying 231 people came close enough to a turnpike and its traffic to strike a pole at all.
For travelers through Newark, the important point is already clear: the plane was recovered safely, but the margin for error was frighteningly small, and investigators are treating it that way.