Air traffic controller heard admitting he messed up’ after catastrophic crash at LaGuardia

Air traffic control audio has captured the moment a controller said he’d “messed up” after a deadly runway collision at New York’s LaGuardia Airport.

Two people died when an Air Canada plane crashed into a fire truck on the runway of LaGuardia Airport in New York late on Sunday night, local time.

More than 70 passengers and four crew members were on board the Air Canada flight, and two officers were in the emergency vehicle.

The pilot and co-pilot were killed in the collision, while 41 people were taken to hospital, some with serious injuries.

The Federal Aviation Administration delayed flights in and out of the airport as investigators determined how the crash unfolded.

The aircraft, an Air Canada Express CRJ-900 operated by Jazz Aviation, had departed from Montreal.

Audio from LiveATC.net captured the frantic moments inside the control tower as the incident unfolded.

Controllers can be heard urgently trying to stop the fire truck from crossing the runway.

“Stop, stop, stop. Stop, Truck One. Stop,” one controller says repeatedly.

Shortly afterwards, another transmission appears to capture a controller admitting fault.

“Yeah, I know I was here. I tried to reach out to my staff and we were dealing with an emergency earlier. I messed up,” the voice says.

Flight tracking data from Flightradar24 indicates the aircraft struck the vehicle at about 24 miles per hour (39 km/h) shortly before midnight local time.