Retired JFK controller Kennedy Steve walks through the ATC audio of a 2025 LaGuardia rejected takeoff with United 2657 on the runway.
What the video covers
Written in our own words. It only describes what the video shows and says.Kennedy Steve, a retired air traffic controller from New York JFK, listens back to the tower recording of a night at LaGuardia in May 2025. An American Eagle regional jet operated by Republic Airways, callsign Brickyard 4736, was cleared for takeoff on runway 13 while United 2657, a Boeing 737, was still taxiing on that same runway. He plays the audio in sequence and stops it at each step to explain what the controllers and crews were doing.
An IFR night and a runway handed over
The weather was poor, with a cloud base of 250 feet. Arrivals used the ILS to runway 4 while departures used runway 13, which he calls a standard setup for LaGuardia in bad weather. United had just landed on runway 4. The local controller then turned it onto runway 13, told it to taxi down that runway and switched it to the ground controller.
Kennedy Steve explains how a tower keeps track of who owns a runway. There is always something physical, such as a strip for runway 13/31. When the ground controller holds that strip, the local controller may taxi aircraft onto the runway but may not use it for landings or departures. When the local controller holds it, ground may not cross or taxi on it without asking. In this sequence, he says, the strip would have gone to ground together with United.
A missed turn and a blocked frequency
United was offered a quick right turn at taxiway Sierra but read back left, a detail Kennedy Steve points out. Brickyard 4736 was told to line up and wait on runway 13. United then missed the turn at Sierra and was told to continue down the runway to Lima. Meanwhile a JetBlue arrival cleared runway 4, the traffic Brickyard had been holding for. Brickyard was then cleared for takeoff at the same moment as Spirit 1940 checked in on the frequency. Because the aircraft and the antenna were both at the airport, Brickyard heard the clearance and read it back.
The ASDE alarm and the stop call
Faint in the background of the recording he picks out an automated voice: the ASDE warning that runway 13 is occupied. According to Kennedy Steve it triggers once a departing aircraft passes 38 knots. Everyone in the tower falls silent when it sounds. The tower controller told Brickyard to stop while Spirit was still reading back its landing clearance. The crew rejected the takeoff and sounded calm on the radio, he notes. The two aircraft ended up less than half a mile apart.
In 28 years he never had to cancel a takeoff clearance himself. He describes it as an instruction a controller only gives to prevent a collision. He wonders what the FAA investigation found about the strip exchange between local and ground. Such investigations exist to stop a repeat rather than to assign blame, he says, pointing to the heavy workload of controllers and to the ASDE-X system as the backup that worked that night.
