Aircraft Hit and run at JFK
 

This is a better narrative. JFK tower and ground bear some responsibility. Departures should have been stopped until they sorted out who was involved. I suspect the use of Alitalia name created some of the confusion with JFK atc.

If that’s a complete recording, that’s some third world ATC right there.

Wow that's weak. Then again it's JFK, so unfortunately not a huge surprise...

Full marks to Air France for persisting in the face of extremely indifferent ATC, er, GTC 👏

While there may have been some minor difficulties with accent I didn't have any issue understanding AF the first time, let alone the further multiple times they tried to explain.

Once Ground got it (or did they?!) I was very surprised they asked AF to find a telephone and call the Tower, that doesn't seem reasonable to me - at least not in the first instance?

To be fair the recording may not be complete, and no doubt more detail will out following investigation but at this stage it appears to me there are a series of holes in the cheese lining up that shouldn't (incl Alitalia crew), and it's just luck that there wasn't a last hole ready for everything to drop through. If nothing else this could make a good training event for various organisations to show how easily things can go awry if people don't do as they should, or are not at the peak of their game all the time.

It would be very interesting comparing the apparent "go-mindedness" of this ATC tower team to that of a USN carrier launch crew. If what I watch on the myriad of YouTube videos out there is accurate, there seems to be a big focus on making sure no-one can see the slightest reason not to launch before giving the thumbs up. I'll bet if you had whispered "collision" and "damage" within 50ft of those guys you would've seen so many crossed arms it would've made your head spin.

IF that's NOT the complete recording, it would even degrade the JFK ATC to a BANned Third World country type of ATC.

And the ITA reaction is what you get, when the ATC is arrogant to the max. Ehhh, Trump country ?

Agree if that recording is 100% correct than it’s very poor from ATC. However the Italian crew must of felt some form of bump or heard a noise as they hit the Air France surely?

It’s an IMMEDIATE press the emergency line and an Aircraft ground incident reaction from a controller in the UK.

Very astute WideScreen!

I did not recognize the JFK ground controller's voice as Trump ... awww, he's a cagey guy!

Not necessarily.

Damage to the AZ A330 appears to have been confined to a winglet (it was in service again a couple of days after arriving at Rome), whereas the AF 777 is still grounded at JFK more than a week after the event, so it's perfectly possible that the crew of the former were unaware of the incident.

How is it that the ground controller is not aware of where AF is? It always bothered me that when I arrived in JFK, I was asked what entry point to the ramp it is that I take or to what gate am I going? Surely I should be controlled and told the routing and the gate, as per the rest of the world operations. JFK just beggars belief….

That’s not the way it works at JFK, nor at quite a few large US airports. May not be what you are used to, but you better get used to it. And that was apparently not a factor in this incident.

The ground controller should have contacted the Tower immediately, does not need to be a long conversation, simply advise Tower, ITA is to return to the terminal due to damage. Needless to say do you really want to be half way across the Atlantic with bells and whistles going off?

I think the language from ATC was poor, seemed to be more questioning the ITA crew vs telling. Naturally if the ITA crew felt nothing, and no red flags up front, false alarm mindset comes to mind.

‘That’s not the way it works at JFK, nor at quite a few large US airports.’

However, in this instance, that was how it did work; and additionally from US experience, how frequent similar situations indicate the fragility of that system’s operation.

An attitude of ‘… better get used to it’ can hide significant hazards, expecting that all crews will manage all situations, all of the time, which questions the level of safety - as observed, or as expected - who views, and when.

What does this mean? Must of felt? It makes no sense to me. But English is not my first language

Very well said safetypee, it absolutely doesn't have to be this way. Combined with the often belligerent and arrogant attitude of controllers at Kennedy (Steve :*) bordering on the unprofessional it really makes things harder than they need to be, and definitely not safer.

It should read "must have felt". It's a common grammatical error.

...by native speakers of English.

The most outrageous part of this IMO is when the GC asked AF008 to copy a phone number for the tower!

This started even earlier, when the GC started questioning the AF008 reporting, whether the event had happened and/or being sure it was Alitalia. It more or less suggests "Hey, I am not going to disrupt the operations, because of your message". Outrageous.