A commercial airliner narrowly avoided a potential midair collision with a military B-52 bomber in North Dakota on Friday, prompting the pilot to take sharp evasive action just before landing.
Delta Flight 3788, operated by SkyWest, was approaching Minot International Airport when the pilot made an abrupt turn to avoid a U.S. Air Force B-52 bomber that suddenly appeared in its flight path. The tense moment was caught on video by a passenger and later shared on social media.
Over the intercom, the pilot apologized to passengers, saying, “Sorry about the aggressive maneuver. It caught me by surprise. This is not normal at all. I don’t know why they didn’t give us a heads up.”
Why Was the Bomber There?
An Air Force spokesperson confirmed that the B-52 was conducting a flyover for the North Dakota State Fair, held in Minot. The aircraft was assigned to nearby Minot Air Force Base. The military is now “looking into” the near-miss incident.
This close call comes just months after a tragic midair collision between an Army helicopter and a jetliner near Washington, D.C., which killed all 67 onboard. That crash—and several other close encounters—sparked renewed concern about the lack of coordination between military and civilian aircraft. A key issue has been military aircraft flying with tracking devices turned off, leaving civilian pilots unaware of their presence.
Investigations are ongoing, with aviation safety experts once again urging stronger communication protocols between military operations and commercial air traffic control to prevent such near-misses in the future.