The pilots of a Southwest Airlines flight departing New York LaGuardia (LGA) made a mistake. What’s wild to me is how unprofessionally the air traffic controller handled that mistake, though, and the clear joy he got from being able to chew out the pilots…
Southwest pilots don’t follow instructions, pay the price
YouTube channel You can see ATC has the air traffic control audio and a visualization of an incident that happened shortly after 7PM local time on Tuesday, November 3, 2026, at New York LaGuardia Airport.
A Southwest Boeing 737-800 was getting ready to depart to Dallas Love Field (DAL), and was just getting permission to taxi to the runway, which is when the issues started:
Air traffic controller: “Southwest 4541, runway 13, give way to an E170 off the left, taxi via L, B, G, hold short of runway 22.”
Southwest pilot: “Taxi runway 13 via L, B, G, hold short of runway 22, give way to E170 off our left, Southwest 4541.”
The Southwest plane then started taxiing, but immediately cut off the Embraer E170 it was supposed to give way to on the taxiway. That was probably a dumb error (more on that in a bit), but that’s when the air traffic controller really got excited:
Air traffic controller: “Southwest 4541.”
Southwest pilot: “Southwest 4541, go ahead.”
Air traffic controller: “Did you give way to the 175 we told you about?”
Southwest pilot: “Uh, sorry, we were looking at a different one. We’ll still be on B. Are we clear?”
Air traffic controller: “Southwest 4541, hold there. Show me the 175 that you were looking out for.”
Southwest pilot: “We’re looking at the Delta colors to the left, Southwest 4541.”
Air traffic controller: “So that’s the one we told you to give way to and you cut them off, right?”
Southwest pilot: “Affirmative, Southwest 4541. Where would you like us to go?”
Air traffic controller: “Southwest 4541, possible pilot deviation, advise ready to copy a phone number.”
The Southwest pilot then copied down the number, and then the air traffic controller broadcast on frequency that “Southwest looks like just decided to do whatever they want.”
The air traffic controller really was a jerk about this
There are two issues here — the mistake on the part of the Southwest pilots, and how the air traffic controller responded.
Obviously the Southwest pilots screwed up here, as they did cut off the Embraer. As much as Southwest pilots are known for their speedy taxis, I’d be willing to bet this wasn’t intentional, because if you try to fight a NYC-area air traffic controller, you’ll lose every time. 😉
My guess is that the pilots were genuinely confused by the word order of the instructions, and didn’t fully process the instructions until it was too late (which isn’t to excuse it, but just to try to make sense of how this happened).
The instructions were to taxi to “runway 13, give way to an E170 off the left, taxi via L, B, G, hold short of runway 22.” Based purely on those instructions, it wasn’t entirely clear where the Embraer would be, since the instruction to give way was given after the runway assignment.
It seems like a clearer way to describe that would be to give the taxi instructions, and then explicitly say where the plane is that they should be giving way to. So something like “runway 13, taxi via L, B, G, hold short of runway 22, give way to the Delta colors E170 off on your left on A.”
But the real issue was the laser focus that the controller had on just talking down to these pilots and proving a point. He literally stopped traffic so that he could win an argument. By all means give the pilots a number for a possible pilot deviation, and discuss this stuff off frequency. But to stop traffic, argue with the pilots, give them a number, and then throw in another insulting comment, is just uncalled for and incredibly unprofessional.
Compare this to an incident at Boston Logan (BOS) a few weeks back, which I’d argue was more serious. An Etihad Boeing 787 entered a runway without permission and caused a go around. Shocking as it might be to some New York area controllers, the Boston controller didn’t take it as an opportunity to insult someone on frequency, and stop traffic. Instead, he handled it professionally, kept planes moving, and then they got a number for a pilot deviation. That’s how it should be handled.
Bottom line
The pilots of a Southwest Boeing 737 chose the wrong airport to make a mistake at, as it quickly turned into the highlight of the air traffic controller’s day. The air traffic controller stopped traffic so that he could school pilots and give them a number for a possible pilot deviation, rather than keeping planes moving and then discussing this off frequency.
What do you make of this LaGuardia ATC interaction?
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