NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Delta Air Lines jetliner that skidded off a runway at New York's LaGuardia Airport during a snowstorm was moved into a hangar overnight as investigators looked into the mishap, transportation officials said on Friday.
Several of the 127 passengers and five crew members suffered minor injuries when Delta flight 1086, arriving from Atlanta, slid on the tarmac on Thursday morning and came to rest on an embankment just feet from the frigid waters of Flushing Bay.
An image released by the local media showed the Boeing Co MD-88 jetliner being lifted by a crane from its perch on a berm just above the water's edge.
The incident forced the shutdown for more than three hours of LaGuardia Airport, the smallest of the New York metropolitan area's three major airports operated by the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, snarling air traffic along the U.S. East Coast and exacerbating widespread weather-related disruptions.
Earlier on Friday, airport officials reopened the runway where the Delta plane skidded and the airport went back into full operation, the Port Authority said in a statement.
Officials with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), which will examine the flight's black box data, have launched an investigation into the incident.
An NTSB spokesman said investigators would likely release initial findings later on Friday, but did not comment further about a possible cause of the mishap.
The incident has cast a spotlight on how airports determine when to shut down runways during inclement winter weather, which can compromise safety during takeoffs and landings.
The Port Authority said on Thursday the runway where the Delta plane skidded had been plowed just before its landing, and that flight crews on two planes that touched down only minutes earlier had reported "good braking action" after their landings.
(Reporting by Laila Kearney, editing by G Crosse)
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