A UPS cargo jet and a Copa Airlines passenger jet collided at low speed while taxiing at Miami International Airport on Saturday night, November 14, in a ground incident that damaged both aircraft but left no reported injuries, the airport said.

Source: CBS News — statement by Miami International Airport communications director Greg Chin

The airport put the contact at approximately 9:15 p.m. Eastern at the intersection of two taxiways. In its statement, the airport said an arriving aircraft and a departing aircraft 'made contact with each other,' that there were no reported injuries, and that flights were being directed to other taxiways, so there was no impact to airport operations at the time.

The airport statement did not name the airlines or the flights. Recorded Miami Ground air traffic control audio circulating publicly, together with FlightAware data reported by the Daily Mail, identifies the departing aircraft as UPS Flight 358, a Boeing 767 freighter scheduled to fly from Miami to Bogotá, Colombia, and the arriving aircraft as Copa Airlines Flight 427, a Boeing 737 that had just landed after a flight from Panama City, Panama.

Source: Daily Mail, via J News Network

What the tower recording captures

The ground-frequency recording captures the moment in the crews' and the controller's own words. A Copa crew member reports, 'Somebody hit us.' The controller then tells the cargo crew, 'UPS 358, you're supposed to give way to the 73 there,' referring to the Boeing 737. Asked by the controller whether it hit the other aircraft, the UPS crew replies in the recording: 'Yeah we went too far and then he, he clipped us with the wing.'

Reporting based on the recording and on a passenger video from the Copa jet describes the wing of one aircraft making contact with the nose of the other, with debris visible near the nose of the UPS jet. Fox Sports journalist Andy Slater, reporting on X and cited by the Daily Mail, reported that the nose of one plane made contact with the wingtip of the other. The full extent of the damage to either aircraft has not been officially confirmed, and who moved, how far apart the jets were and the cause remain unknown in the first reporting.

Airport says operations were not affected

'There are no reported injuries, and flights are being directed to other taxiways, so there is no impact to airport operations at this time,' Greg Chin, communications director at Miami International Airport, said in a statement carried by CBS News and the Daily Mail. Miami-Dade Fire Rescue also reported no injuries. The Daily Mail reported it had approached UPS and Miami-Dade Fire and Rescue for further comment, and the airport did not immediately respond to the New York Post's request for comment on Saturday night.

A second difficult night for US aviation

The collision came at the end of a bruising weekend for American air travel. On Friday, November 13, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered a nationwide ground stop over what it called a communication issue impacting all Air Route Traffic Control Centers; the stoppage lasted about five hours before it was lifted late Friday afternoon, and airports across the country, including Miami, spent Saturday working through delays and cancellations. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy noted on Friday that the return to normal operations would be gradual as airlines repositioned crews and aircraft, and FAA Administrator Bryan Bedford indicated the national schedule was expected to return to standard operations by the end of Sunday, November 15. The first reporting does not establish any connection between Friday's ground stop and Saturday night's taxiway collision, and officials have not suggested one.

Miami International is one of the busiest US gateways to Latin America and the Caribbean, for passengers and for air cargo alike, and the UPS flight involved was bound for Bogotá, a key South American cargo route. For Punjabi and other South Asian travellers and freight businesses that route family visits, students and time-sensitive cargo through big US hubs, even a contained ground incident is a reminder of how quickly a single taxiway can become the weak point of a whole evening's schedule — on this occasion, the airport says, the wider operation kept moving.

What happens next

As of the first reports on Saturday night and early Sunday, the FAA, the National Transportation Safety Board, UPS and Copa Airlines had not released statements about the collision. Ground incidents of this kind are normally reconstructed from air traffic control recordings, flight and taxi data and crew interviews, which is how investigators establish what clearances were issued and what each aircraft did. Travellers through Miami were told the national flight schedule should be back to normal by the end of Sunday, November 15, and the airport said flights were already being routed around the closed taxiway intersection. This story will be updated when the airlines or federal investigators publish their first findings.