Passenger jet avoids collision with B-52 bomber

A passenger jet avoided a collision with a B-52 bomber by making a hard, turn midair in the skies over North Dakota.

A SkyWest spokesperson told The Hill news outlet that SkyWest Flight 3788, operating as Delta Connection from Minneapolis, safely landed in Minot, N.D., on Friday, after the pilot “performed a go-around when another aircraft became visible in their flight path.”

The spokesperson said that the airline is investigating the incident, and the Federal Aviation Administration told NewsNation that it is also conducting its own probe.

An Air Force spokesperson said it is “looking into the matter,” confirming that “a B-52 aircraft assigned to Minot AFB conducted a flyover of the North Dakota State Fair on Friday evening.”

A passenger on the flight posted a recording of the pilot's comments online in which he told them what was happening before he made an “aggressive maneuver” to avoid a collision and apologized for the incident.

The pilot told the passengers that the area has no radar, so the “tower does everything visually” and instructed the passenger jet to report as they were about six miles from the airport, which the pilot said they did.

“I think he realized that the spacing wasn’t going to work, and he said, ‘Turn right,’” the pilot explained.

“I said, ‘There’s an airplane over there.’ And he says, ‘Turn left,’” the pilot continued. “And then by the time we read back the clearance, [we] looked over and saw the airplane that was kind of coming on a converging course with us.”

“And so given his speed – it was a military [aircraft], I don’t know how fast they were going, but they were a lot faster than us – I felt it was the safest thing to turn behind it,” he said.

The pilot apologized and said that he was also caught by surprise and was not given a warning that the B-52 bomber would be sharing the airspace.

“So sorry about the aggressive maneuver. It caught me by surprise. This is not, not normal at all,” the pilot said. “I don’t know why they didn’t give us a heads-up because the Air Force Base does have radar, and nobody said, ‘Hey, there’s also a B-52 in the pattern.’”

“Long story short, it was not fun, but I do apologize for it, and thank you for understanding. It was kind of a, not a fun day at work,” he added, to which the passengers applauded.