Back From the Dead: Delta Jet With Tail Sheared Off Returns to Service After Year-Long Rebuild
- A Delta Air Lines regional jet that had its tailfin sliced off by an Airbus A350 at Atlanta Hartsfield last year has miraculously escaped the scrappers yard and has, instead, been rebuilt. Aviation photographer, Brian Uretsky, got the first pictures of the repaired plane.
As comeback stories go, this is a pretty remarkable one: A Delta Air Lines regional jet that had its tailfin sliced off in an astonishing accident at Atlanta Hartsfield Airport last September is back flying after undergoing extensive repairs.
The 11-year-old CRJ-900LR regional jet operated by Delta’s wholly-owned subsidiary Endeavour Air was waiting to enter the runway for takeoff on September 10, 2024, when the wing tip of a passing Airbus A350, also owned by Delta, struck its tail.
The force of the collision was so great that the tailfin of the regional jet was sliced off, folding over to one side of the plane. Remarkably, only one flight attendant was lightly injured in the accident.
Delta avoids a write-off and sends the plane for extensive repairs
Given the degree of damage inflicted upon the regional jet, you might think that the plane would be a write-off, with Delta simply calling in its insurers to take care of the costs.
You would, however, be wrong. Delta clearly had no intentions of scrapping a plane that could still have two decades or more worth of service left in it, so the airline sent the plane away to a maintenance hangar where engineers have been working hard to fix it for the past 12 months.
Last month, aviation photographer Brian Uretsky took the first photos of the aircraft (registration: N302PQ) outside of the hangar and sporting an entirely new tail section.
Posting photos of the repaired plane on Instagram, Brian wrote: “It’s finally back in service after a year of downtime.”
In response, one person wrote: “I was one of the mechanics on that project. One hell of a job getting that thing back in service.”
Where is the plane now?
According to public flight tracking data supplied by Flight Radar 24, the aircraft flew for the first time since the accident on September 24 for a short one-and-a-half-hour test flight.
Several days later, the plane completed a short 25-minute flight to Middle Georgia Regional Airport, where it has remained since. Presumably, the aircraft went to this airport because it is home to an aircraft painting facility where the Delta ‘widget’ can be painted on the new tail.
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) has yet to publish its full report on last September’s accident, but a preliminary report revealed some interesting facts about the lead-up to the dramatic collision.
What we know about the accident so far
The regional jet had been preparing for takeoff for a flight to Lafayette at around 10 am on September 10, 2024, but had been asked to stop on a taxiway before entering the active runway.
The pilots of the regional jet stopped short of the runway entrance by around 56 feet, which put the plane within striking distance of a passing Airbus A350, which was taxiing on an adjacent taxiway.
The Captain of the A350 had been looking straight ahead and to his left, looking out for a potential ‘conflict’ with traffic on another taxiway. What he didn’t realize, however, was that the biggest threat was on his right-hand side, where the regional jet was holding for takeoff.
United Airlines spent millions of dollars to fix a damaged Boeing 767
This isn’t the only time that a badly damaged aircraft that everyone thought would be a write-off has actually been put back in service. Last March, a 33-year-old United Airlines Boeing 767 returned to the skies after undergoing seven months of extensive repairs for damage sustained during a botched landing.
The accident occurred in July 2023 during what should have been a routine landing. However, the nose wheel made contact with the runway with an “abnormal force” that caused wrinkles and tears in the skin of the fuselage.
The pilot who was at the controls of the plane was sacked by United, and he later tried to sue the airline for defamation, claiming he had been made a scapegoat for the incident.
The pilot’s lawsuit was dismissed by a district judge.
