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‘Several’ injured after Delta flight crashes at Toronto airport

Emergency personnel work at the scene of a Delta Airlines plane crash at Toronto Pearson International Airport on Monday, Feb. 17, 2025, in Toronto. Several passengers were injured on the flight arriving from Minneapolis, resulting in the suspension of all flights at Canada’s busiest airport. (Katherine KY Cheng/Getty Images/TNS)
By María Luisa Paúl and Amanda Coletta Washington Post

A Delta Air Lines flight crashed at Toronto Pearson International Airport on Monday, coming to rest upside down on the tarmac, according to images shared on social media.

Delta said in a statement that there were no fatalities but that “several” injured customers were brought to local hospitals. All 80 people on board - 76 passengers and four crew members - were evacuated, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

The Bombardier CRJ-900 departed Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport about 10:30 a.m. local time Monday, according to the aircraft tracker FlightAware. The flight, operated by Minneapolis-based regional airline Endeavor Air, crashed while landing at the Toronto airport around 2:45 p.m. local time, the FAA said.

Joshua McNamara, a spokesman for the air ambulance and medical transport service Ornge, said it transported three critically injured passengers - including a child, a man in his 60s and a woman in her 40s - to hospitals. Twelve other people were brought to hospitals with injuries, said Lawrence Saindon, superintendent for Peel Regional Paramedic Services.

The crash in Canada comes amid heightened scrutiny of flight safety following a midair collision over the Potomac River last month between an Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines passenger jet near Reagan National Airport. That incident raised questions about operational protocols and communication.

What caused the Delta aircraft to flip upside down on Monday remains unknown, but conditions at the time were harsh. Westerly winds - which blow from west to east - were gusting at up to 40 mph just before 3 p.m. local time, and the temperature was about 17 degrees. Snow showers were in the area, with the airport reporting five-mile visibility.

Earlier Monday, the airport warned that frigid temperatures and high winds were moving in, creating difficult conditions for both ground crews and pilots. The airport was expecting a “busy day,” it wrote on X, handling over 130,000 travelers across 1,000 flights as airlines scrambled to recover from a weekend storm that dumped nearly 9 inches of snow. Crews had worked overnight to clear the runways “so planes can safely arrive and depart.”

The crash prompted the FAA to issue a ground stop order for the airport. Delta said that it was “working to connect with customers traveling from, to or through” Toronto Pearson.

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada is leading an investigation into the incident with assistance from the National Transportation Safety Board. Anita Anand, Canada’s transportation minister, wrote on X that she was “closely following the serious incident.”