Copa 737 & UPS 767 Collide On Miami Airport Taxiway: Pilot Blames Checklist Distraction

Last night, a Copa Boeing 737 and a UPS Boeing 767 collided on a taxiway at Miami International Airport (MIA). South Florida is known for its horrendous drivers, and I guess that trend is making its way to the taxiways at airports as well.

UPS 767 fails to stop, hits Copa Boeing 737 in Miami

This accident happened shortly after 9PM on Saturday, November 14, 2026. It involves a Copa Boeing 737-800 that had just arrived from Panama City (PTY) as flight CM427, and a UPS Boeing 767-300 that was getting ready to depart to Bogota (BOG) as flight 5X358.

The UPS 767 had been advised to give way to the Copa 737 on the taxiway, but the pilots failed to do that. As a result, the wing of the Copa 737 hit the nose of the UPS 767. While a full investigation will of course be performed, the air traffic control audio gives us a good sense of what happened:

Copa pilot: “427, somebody hit us.”
ATC: “427, roger. UPS, you’re supposed to give way to the 73 there.”
UPS pilot: “Roger, we running checklist, runway change.”
ATC: “UPS 358, did you hit that aircraft?”
UPS pilot: “Yeah, we went too far, and then he clipped us with the wing.”

So as you can see, the UPS pilots were at fault here, and the excuse seems to be that they were distracted because they were going through checklists because of a runway change.

Fortunately there were no major injuries, but two people on the Copa flight did complain of minor back pain. The damage to the planes is extensive, though, including to the nose of the UPS 767 and the left wing of the Copa 737.

Can I just respectfully make a point here, without being sarcastic? If the accident were reversed here, and the female, foreign pilot had been at fault for this, we would immediately see people screaming “DEI.” Meanwhile when someone sounds like your average American dude, we just consider it to be an honest mistake.

The concept of “DEI” in the aviation world is not about hiring unqualified people, but it’s about expanding the potential pool of people who could qualify for a job, so that the best people can be hired.

Why do I even bring this up now? Well, remember the recent Amazon Air crash at Miami Airport? When the air traffic control audio came out, people heard a foreign accent from the pilot. People immediately started yelling “DEI,” talking about H1-B visas, etc.

However, that was the pilot communicating, and the pilot actually flying was a white, older, ex-military dude. And he was flying completely recklessly, and failed to listen to the first officer’s warnings. I know it’s hard when reality doesn’t match people’s narratives, but that’s why I feel like it’s important to call these things out.

This came shortly after another close call at the airport

Presumably this is coincidental, but I think it’s interesting to note that on November 5, 2026, there was a very close call on a taxiway at Miami Airport, not that far from where this happened.

A Lufthansa Boeing 747-8 was departing to Frankfurt (FRA) as LH463, and an American Boeing 787-8 had just arrived from Philadelphia (PHL) as AA1155. The American 787 was advised to “give way to Lufthansa off the right,” which… they then failed to do.

As you’d expect, the Lufthansa pilots took the situation very seriously. The Lufthansa pilot said “we had to make a full stop at a full taxi speed, American is turning in our way.” The air traffic controller responded by saying “they’ve made every wrong turn possible” (in reference to the American plane — which I don’t actually think is true here). The Lufthansa pilot said they’d file a report, because that “was very close to an accident in the making.”

I love how German the Lufthansa pilot is in how he handles this, and how he finishes by saying “you need to make sure stuff like that doesn’t happen too often.” Lol, you don’t say…

Bottom line

A Copa Boeing 737 and a UPS Boeing 767 had an accident on a taxiway at Miami Airport. The UPS 767 was supposed to give way to the Copa 737, but failed to do so, as the pilots claimed they were distracted by their checklists.

This accident took out a chunk of the wing of the Copa 737, and did quite a bit of damage to the nose of the UPS 767 as well. Earlier this month, a very close call between a Lufthansa 747 and American 787 also got quite a bit of attention, but fortunately this had a better outcome.

What do you make of this Miami Airport accident?