With more than 33 million passengers annually, LaGuardia Airport mainly serves domestic flights and offers very few international services. It is the smallest of New York’s main airports, but the rate of flights is very high.
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First local, with some exceptions
Officially established in 1939, the airport began operations in the late 1920s, having first served as a private airfield and amusement park in the early 20e century. The venue is named after Fiorello La Guardia, who served as mayor of New York City between 1934 and 1945, when it was established. Nowadays, the terminal is mainly used for transit between American cities, but it serves a few flights from four Canadian cities, namely Montreal, Toronto, Ottawa and Halifax. Some flights also come from the Bahamas, Bermuda or the Dutch island of Aruba, but the majority of international flights pass through John F. Kennedy Airport, opened a few years later, in 1948.
PHOTO CHARLY TRIBALLEAU, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE ARCHIVES
A Delta Airlines aircraft lands at LaGuardia on March 22, 2026.
Little space to work
Despite this, LaGuardia is a “very compact airport, with a lot of traffic”, summarizes the expert in transport planning at the University of Montreal, Pierre Barrieau, who believes that this particularity must have played a role in the accident. “What we need to understand is that we find many more planes there than elsewhere, because we are talking about smaller and domestic aircraft, so the rate of flights and landings is very high per number of passengers,” he explains in an interview. “It is also an old airport, which is very compact, where there are not necessarily as many taxiways to increase the chances of avoiding what unfortunately happened,” he adds.
A first in 34 years
Generally, fatal incidents like that of Sunday evening are very rare at LaGuardia Airport. The last event resulting in deaths at this airport dates back to March 22, 1992, exactly 34 years ago to the day. That day, a plane flying to Cleveland crashed into Flushing Bay shortly after takeoff due to excess ice on its wings. The defrosting procedures then proved inadequate. The investigation also revealed that the pilot had tried to take off at too low a speed. The toll was particularly heavy, with 27 of the 51 passengers on board losing their lives.
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The risk increases
Over the past 30 years, several loss of control and accidents have occurred at LaGuardia, causing minor and sometimes major injuries. The most notable was that of January 15, 2009, when a US Airways plane had to land on the Hudson after both engines failed. The event was even the subject of a film and was renamed Miracle on the Hudsonthe heroism of all the staff and pilots having also been highlighted. According to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), approximately 80 to 120 incursions, in other words the unexpected crossing of a plane with another vehicle, occur each month at American airports. The risk of collisions is therefore increasing every day, especially due to the growth in the number of connections, congestion and controller fatigue.
From the “third world” to a model
New York airports have often been the subject of political criticism for their poor state. In September 2016, American President Donald Trump, who was then a presidential candidate, even compared them to the “third world” during a television debate. Two years earlier, in 2014, Joe Biden made similar remarks while serving as vice president during the Obama administration. Since then, LaGuardia Airport has invested nearly 8 billion US dollars to get a makeover. Major work has been done on all terminals, to make them more spacious and modern. It was the first reconstruction of a U.S. airport in more than 25 years. The project was finally completed in 2024, and is often cited as an example around the world.
