JetBlue plane avoids mid-air collision with U.S. air force jet near Venezuela

'They passed directly in our flight path.... They don’t have their transponder turned on. It’s outrageous,' the JetBlue pilot said in a conversation with air traffic control.

A JetBlue Airways pilot narrowly avoided a mid-air collision with a U.S. air force military aircraft that entered its flight path on Friday while travelling near Venezuela, according to the airline.

“We almost had a mid-air collision up here,” the JetBlue pilot said, according to a recording of his conversation with air traffic control. “They passed directly in our flight path…. They don’t have their transponder turned on. It’s outrageous.”

JetBlue Flight 1112 had departed from the Caribbean island of Curaçao, bound for New York City’s JFK airport.

“We just had traffic pass directly in front of us within five miles of us – maybe two or three miles – but it was an air-to-air refueller from the United States air force and he was at our altitude. We had to stop our climb,” the pilot said.

“It has been outrageous with the unidentified aircraft within our air. You are totally right, sir,” the controller replied.

“We had to stop our climb and actually just descend to avoid hitting them,” the pilot told the controller. “We’ll do a report on our end too but they did not have their transponders turned on so there’s no way for you to have seen them.”

The U.S. air force plane then headed into Venezuelan airspace, the pilot said.

Derek Dombrowski, a spokesperson for JetBlue, said the company has “reported this incident to federal authorities and will participate in any investigation.”