*Updated May 5, 2026 to include additional information and details about the NTSB’s investigation.
On Sunday, May 3, a United Airlines flight with over 200 people on board was reportedly descending at around 160 miles per hour when it dramatically crashed into a truck driving on the New Jersey Turnpike.
United Airlines confirmed that no one on board the Boeing 767 was physically injured due to the incident. Flight UA169 was heading to Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) from Venice, Italy. Per CNN, New Jersey State Police spokesman SFC Charles Marchan separately shared that the truck driver was hospitalized and sustained minor, non-life-threatening injuries.
Footage of the incident was captured from multiple angles. One of them is a dashcam clip taken inside the involved bread bakery delivery truck. It shows the driver, Warren Boardley of Baltimore, focusing on the road when the vehicle was suddenly smashed into on the driver’s side, sending glass flying. A plane wheel seemingly collided with the driver’s side window and/or the windshield. In addition to hitting the delivery truck, the plane also hit a streetlight. The latter subsequently hit a Jeep also on the turnpike, according to state police.
The plane flew into Newark Liberty’s Runway 29 just a few hundred feet from where vehicles drive on the New Jersey Turnpike. CBS reported that Flight UA169 landed there instead of a more typical longer runway due to Sunday’s wind conditions. The source further stated that Runway 29 is the shortest at Newark Liberty.
United Airlines’ Formal Response To Collision Incident, NTSB Investigates
United Airlines said the plane ultimately reached its gate at Newark Liberty. The carrier said, “Upon its final approach into Newark International Airport, United flight 169 came into contact with a light pole. The aircraft landed safely, taxied to the gate normally, and no passengers or crew were injured. Our maintenance team is evaluating damage to the aircraft, and we will investigate how this occurred.”
“We will conduct a rigorous flight safety investigation into the incident, and our crew has been removed from service as part of the process,” the airline added.
According to ABC 7 New York, the Federal Aviation Administration and National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) are also investigating what happened. On May 4, the latter organization classified the incident as an accident “due to the extent of damage to the airplane.”
NTSB additionally disclosed in its X post that it has sent an investigator to EWR to interview flight crew. The worker is also expected to obtain the cockpit voice recorder and United Airlines’s flight data recorder, aka the “black box.” With all the information collected, the organization’s preliminary report “outlining the facts and circumstances of the event is expected within 30 days.”
The NTSB’s series of updates made no mention of the United Airlines plane hitting the bakery delivery truck. Regarding its look into the incident, the organization noted that its investigation will “examine multiple factors, including flight operations, meteorological conditions, human performance, crew resource management, aircraft performance, and air traffic control.”
