American Airlines Passenger Jet and Military Blackhawk Chopper Collide Over Washington DC

Comments

• Old_Joe

  January 30

  Oh boy.
• Mona

  January 30

  Sad.
  
  Has the SOB blamed Biden yet?
• Crash

  January 30

  Horrible. no survivors. The main runway is the busiest in the country. I'd have guessed chicago or jfk.
• hank

  January 30 edited January 30

  Mona said:

  Has the SOB blamed Biden yet?

  Perhaps indirectly. He pointed fingers at the civilian government employees in the control tower in a social media post last night. News Story
  
  “Why didn't the control tower tell the helicopter what to do instead of asking if they saw the plane. This is a bad situation that looks like it should have been prevented. NOT GOOD!!!,”
  
  @Mona had it right. I didn’t see this coming. Has the man no limits to indecency? Thursday Trump blamed Obama and Biden in a rambling statement / press conference for being lax on air safety. Claimed past Democrat initiatives towards ethnic diversity at the FAA led directly to this tragic loss of life. Shitty! WTF! One wonders if he also rifles through the pockets of the dead? Even Putin might be embarrassed by such vulgarity.
  
  One does wonder how the FIC weighing in publicly may affect the inevitable years-long litigation process that is bound to follow. Might this interference taint the investigation as well? And if he wants safer less congested airports and better ATC then his brainchild of stopping all federal grants is sadly off base. How to you get more with less?
  
  Interestingly, the former head of the FAA resigned the day before Trump’s inauguration. No reason given, but the announcement was made well in advance. No new administrator has yet been nominated.
  
  One may hope Hegseth can stay off the bottle long enough to determine why the military chopper was clearly where it shouldn’t have been.
  
  My frustrations - Trump and family members don’t fly commercially. I doubt Musk or others around him do. Corporate CEOs who bankroll him rarely do. While they can talk a good game here the truth is that our airports and civil air transport operations have long suffered from underfunding, over-crowding, staff shortages and in some cases outdated equipment and technology. I don’t expect that to change any time soon. So talk all you want FIC & Company. And then go climb aboard your government funded or private jet and fly to some out of the way smaller airport where your limo awaits.
  
  
• Old_Joe

  January 30

  WASHINGTON—Just after 8:47 p.m. on Wednesday, an air-traffic controller at Reagan National Airport relayed a seemingly ordinary inquiry and instruction:
  
  “PAT25, do you have the CRJ in sight?” he asked a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter, requesting it keep a lookout for an American Airlines Bombardier jet carrying 60 passengers and four crew members from Wichita, Kan. The helicopter was on a training mission, officials would later say.
  
  “PAT25, pass behind the CRJ,” the controller then said as American Airlines flight 5342 descended over the Potomac River just moments before landing. “CRJ” is aviation shorthand for Canadair Regional Jet.
  
  =====================
  
  The cause of the collision remains under investigation.
  
  It couldn’t be determined if the Black Hawk heard or acknowledged the request to keep an eye out for the Bombardier. A former federal aviation official told the Journal that air-traffic controllers gave the helicopter clear instructions to pass behind it.
  
  Both aircraft were somewhere between 200 and 400 feet over the Potomac around the moment they collided, according to records reviewed by the Journal. The passenger jet was seconds away from finishing its roughly three-hour flight from Kansas.
  
  Above excerpted from a current Wall Street Journal report.
  
• Old_Joe

  January 30 edited January 30

  Here are excerpts from a report by NPR. For those interested, the NPR report includes approximately 30 minutes of recorded Terminal Approach Control (TRACON) radio traffic at Reagan International prior to and through the collision.

  
  Minutes before the collision, controllers can be heard on their radios directing multiple planes taking off and landing at the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
  
  Amid this heavy, but normal, traffic for the busy airport, the Black Hawk helicopter approaches airspace shared with multiple planes making their way in and out of Reagan. One plane, the American Airlines regional Bombardier CRJ jet carrying 64 people, appears on the radar as the one closest to the helicopter as it makes its approach to Reagan to land.
  
  Within 30 seconds of the recording reviewed by NPR, the military helicopter (referred to as PAT 25 on the radio) is told by Reagan's controllers that the plane is incoming and says, "traffic just south of the Woodrow Bridge, a CRJ, its 1,200 feet setting up for runway 33."
  
  The helicopter pilot acknowledges it sees an incoming plane, but it is unclear if it is looking at the correct aircraft. The conditions Wednesday night were dark, but clear. However, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and President Trump have said crew members on the helicopter were wearing night vision goggles, which can restrict the user's line of vision.
  
  The Black Hawk pilot is heard on the radio responding, "PAT 25, has the traffic in sight, request visual separation." "Visual separation" means the pilot acknowledges that they see the incoming aircraft and are informing the air traffic controller that they will avoid getting too close to the plane. The tower then approves visual separation.
  
  But almost 40 seconds later, the helicopter and airplane continue on the same path, according to the flight radar.
  
  As the two aircraft get closer to each other, an air traffic controller checks in with the military helicopter asking the pilot, "PAT25, do you have the CRJ in sight?" The air traffic controller then tells the helicopter pilot to "pass behind" the American Airlines jet.
  
  Richard Levy, a retired American Airlines pilot and aviation instructor, told NPR's Here and Now that the controller was doing "a magnificent job" guiding aircraft through the air and found no fault with the instructions the controller gave both the helicopter and the American Airlines jet.
  
  The helicopter pilot checks in saying that the plane is in sight and again requests "visual separation" which is granted. But the two aircraft continue on the same path. Seconds later, gasps and shouts can be heard from the air traffic control tower as the helicopter and jet collide.
• gman57

  January 30

  So sad... I hate to add to the disgust that's going on but must since NPR is mentioned above. There are several articles now circulating about current investigations into NPR and CPB. Project 2025 plans are to get rid of them as has been the case in several previous gop administrations.
• Old_Joe

  January 30

  The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) announced that investigators have recovered the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder from the airplane involved in Wednesday night’s midair collision with an army helicopter near Reagan airport in Washington DC, Reuters reports. The recorders are now at the NTSB’s labs for evaluation.
  
• Old_Joe

  January 30

  Note: It's some 50 years since I was an Air Traffic Controller, so the radio technology may have changed. But if it is still the same, civilian air traffic and military air traffic use completely different radio channels (frequencies). The controllers can of course hear both, but the civilian and military air traffic cannot hear each other. I'm not suggesting that this could be a possible contributing factor in this particular situation- just mentioning it for background info.
• gman57

  January 30 edited January 30

  I read the helicopter was on a military training mission, if so could it have had a junior pilot etc... All speculation, we need to wait for the offical reports.
• Old_Joe

  January 30 edited January 30

  You're very close- there were three people aboard: a flight instructor, a junior pilot receiving training/evaluation, and a third crewperson.
• hank

  January 30 edited January 30

  ”But if it is still the same, civilian air traffic and military air traffic use completely different radio channels (frequencies). The controllers can of course hear both, but the civilian and military air traffic cannot hear each other.”
  
  Yes - I’ve heard that mentioned recently in regard to the current situation. A reference was made to pilots being able to hear only one side of some 2-way communications. Can’t say who mentioned it, but I think it’s still as you remember it @Old_Joe.
  
  An experienced Black Hawk pilot / instructor remarked this evening that the typical crew on this type of training mission is 4 rather than the 3 that were aboard. 4 sets of eyes is considered necessary to assure good 360 degree all around vision and she believes this will be found to have been a contributing factor.
  
  A lot of mention has been made to how night vision goggles (believed to have been used by the chopper crew) can cause a great deal of “noise” and distortion when they are used near bright city lights.
  
  
  I’m following the story online and on the cable networks. Don’t plan to add much to this thread I hastily tossed up after I heard the news last night. You’re doing a great job with the updates OJ. Thank you.
• Crash

  January 31

  Project 2025....
  
  Dismantle, destroy, destruct. It amounts to intentional SUBVERSION. Which is the Repugnant Party's raison d'etre. Anti-science. Anti-reason. Anti-fact. Anti-truth.
  "Deep State?" Bullshit.
• stillers

  January 31 edited January 31

  As I posted on the other currently running thread, "Politics & Racism...",
  On the truth and facts side, you may find this detailed, heartfelt analysis by Capt Steeeve with a map and the actual audio recordings to be:
  
• Mona

  January 31

  @stillers thank you for your post and YouTube. However, you are going to confuse Trump with facts.
• stillers

  January 31 edited January 31

  @Mona, for posters as wonderful as you and some others here, I guess I'm just going to have to take that risk!
  
  And who knows, maybe he'll confuse these facts as "common sense" (sic) and use them in his next blabbering presser!
• Sven

  January 31

  This is a truly tragic accident. In the past, all presidents offer their condolences to the victims right away on TV, then made visit to the sites soon afterward. This man is disgusting to the nation.
• Observant1

  February 1 edited February 1

  @stillers
  
  Thank you for the link to Captain Steve's video.
  His expertise is very beneficial for analyzing the audio communication and providing proper context.
  What a terrible tragedy!
• Mark

  February 1

  From The Borowitz Report
  
  The GOP war on air safety
• Old_Joe

  February 1 edited February 1

  I really do not understand one aspect of this disaster: the apparent lack of positive identification of the passenger jet by the helicopter.
  
  From what information has been released up to this point, the tower seems to have asked the helicopter if they had the jet in sight. The helicopter answered in the affirmative, and requested visual separation, which the tower granted. This transaction placed the responsibility for separation squarely upon the helicopter.
  
  My question is simply this: How did anyone involved in this transaction know for certain that what the helicopter said was accurate? It was night after all, and there were quite a few aircraft in the immediate area. So was it just taken for a fact (ie: "assumed") that the helicopter had the correct aircraft in sight?
  
  As a long-ago en-route air traffic controller I did not have any experience in tower work, so I really have no background info to fall back on. But I have to suggest that this entire procedure (at least as it appears at this point) seems pretty slack to me.
  
  I want to emphasize that I am not suggesting that any aspect of the "visual separation" procedure was violated by anyone involved. I am simply wondering if that procedure might not need some additional safety requirements.
• Derf

  February 1

  @Old_Joe You maybe correct that they were locked on the wrong aircraft. Appears 4 crew members are need for 360 visibility on that copter. Only three on their fatal journey!
• Old_Joe

  February 1

  Excerpts from a current NPR report:

  Three days after the midair collision of an Army helicopter and an American Airlines passenger plane near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, air safety investigators said on Saturday that they are still working to fill in some key details that could point to the cause of the crash.
  
  They are looking into whether the pilots from the Army's Black Hawk helicopter experienced vision impairment while flying in the dark skies and whether the copter deviated from its normal route.
  
  The Black Hawk may have been flying higher than it should have been, said representatives from the National Transportation Safety Board, an independent federal agency leading the investigation, during a briefing on Saturday evening.
  
  But investigators stopped short of confirming multiple media reports, based on publicly available flight data, that the helicopter breached aviation rules that require helicopters on that route to stay below 200 feet.
  
  J. Todd Inman, a member of the NTSB, said that the helicopter was on a training mission. The aircraft would typically use night vision in such an event. Investigators are still working to confirm whether crew members were wearing night vision goggles at the time of the crash, Inman said, a factor that could play a role in the cause of the accident.
  
  "We do not know at this time if the night vision goggles were actively being worn," he said.
  
  Preliminary data shows the Black Hawk was flying at an altitude of 325 feet at the time of the crash, according to Inman. Reagan National is one of the most congested airports in the country. Aviation rules require helicopters on that route above the Potomac to stay below 200 feet. AA Flight 5342's last transmitted altitude was about 300 feet.
  
  Data downloaded from the two recording devices recovered from the passenger plane is under analysis, investigators said. The cockpit recorder from the Black Hawk, commonly known as a black box, was recovered in good condition, Inman said. Data from the devices could be key for investigators in determining what led to the crash.
  
  The NTSB is leading the investigation as it probes another plane crash. Two days after the D.C.-area collision, a small plane plummeted near a Philadelphia shopping center, killing all six people aboard and one person on the ground.
• hank

  February 6 edited February 7

  Military Helicopter Was Operating With Key Safety System Turned Off - U.S. News
  
  Excerpt from story:
  
  A key safety system was turned off on the U.S. Army helicopter that collided with an American Airlines regional jet last week near Washington's Reagan Airport, killing 67. Senate Commerce Committee chair Ted Cruz told reporters the Black Hawk helicopter had turned off its automatic dependent surveillance-broadcast (ADS-B), which is permitted for military aircraft.
  
  "This was a training mission, so there was no compelling national security reason for ADS-B to be turned off," Cruz said after a briefing from the National Transportation Safety Board and Federal Aviation Administration.
  
  In the deadliest U.S. air disaster in more than 20 years, the aircraft collided last week, with both aircraft plunging into the Potomac River. The helicopter was flying about 100 feet (30.5 m) over the maximum allowed for that route, the NTSB said earlier.
  
  ADS-B is an advanced surveillance technology to track aircraft location. Cruz noted the helicopter had a transponder so it would appear on radar but ADS-B is significantly more accurate.
  
  Last week, Senator Maria Cantwell, the top Democrat on the committee, questioned why the FAA since 2018 has allowed military flights to fly with their installed ADS-B equipment off.
  
  
  See Also NYT story
  
  Excerpt from Story.
  
  Technology that would have allowed air traffic controllers to better track the movement of an Army helicopter before it collided with a passenger jet over the Potomac River last week was turned off at the time of the crash, Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of Texas, said in an interview on Thursday.
  
  Members of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, of which Mr. Cruz is chairman, received a closed-door briefing with the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board on the midair collision between an American Airlines commercial jet and a Black Hawk helicopter near Ronald Reagan National Airport that killed 67 people last week.
  
  When in use, the technology, called Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast, or ADS-B, broadcasts an aircraft’s position, altitude and speed.
  
  It allows air traffic controllers to not rely solely on radar tracking, which can have a delay of a few seconds. It thus provides an extra safety layer to help prevent crashes.
  
  Military helicopters can turn off the technology during what are called “continuity of government” missions so that no one can track where government officials are being flown. But Mr. Cruz said that was not the case on Jan. 29, the night of the crash.
  -
  
  NOTE: I think Mr. Cruz is a bit confused in what he heard at the closed door NTSB briefing. His insinuation that radar’s ability to function depends on the target aircraft having a transponder does not sound accurate to me. My car’s radar (pretty much standard on newer vehicles) is able to identify other vehicles around me without those cars carrying a transponder. But the inferences in the articles that radar works a bit more slowly than ADS-B does sound accurate.
• Old_Joe

  February 13 edited February 13

  Here's an excerpt from one of my posts, above:

  My question is simply this: How did anyone involved in this transaction know for certain that what the helicopter said was accurate? It was night after all, and there were quite a few aircraft in the immediate area. So was it just taken for a fact (ie: "assumed") that the helicopter had the correct aircraft in sight?
  
  As a long-ago en-route air traffic controller I did not have any experience in tower work, so I really have no background info to fall back on. But I have to suggest that this entire procedure (at least as it appears at this point) seems pretty slack to me.
  

  
  And here's an excerpt from a current report in the New York Times:

  But current and former controllers said the tower had left too much room for confusion. The controller, for instance, told the pilots of the helicopter about the “CRJ” — the American Airlines plane — but did not alert the American pilots to the helicopter. Pilots in both aircraft should have received warnings that they were on a collision course, the current and former controllers said.
  
  The helicopter’s pilots said they had an aircraft in sight, but the controller did not tell them the location of the American Airlines plane in reference to the helicopter’s position; as a result, the helicopter’s pilots may have mistakenly thought they had the American plane in sight when they were looking at another plane or other lights in the night sky.

  Uh-huh.
• Crash

  February 14

  Absolutely awful from every direction. All those people, gone.
• Old_Joe

  February 14

  Altimeter in Black Hawk helicopter may have malfunctioned before DCA mid-air collision
  
  Following are edited excerpts from a current NPR report:

  Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board gave their first on-camera briefing in almost two weeks since the January 29 mid-air collision involving a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines regional jet that was trying to land at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
  
  NTSB chairwoman Jennifer Homendy said the collision between the helicopter and the "CRJ" airplane happened at 278 feet above the river. The helicopter was supposed to be no higher than 200 feet. However, Homendy says it's unclear whether the altimeters in the helicopter were showing the pilots the proper altitude. She says investigators are "seeing conflicting information in the data" and are continuing their analysis.
  
  Homendy says some radio transmissions between the air traffic controller and the Black Hawk crew weren't fully heard by the pilots of the helicopter either.
  
  She says at least one transmission — the one 17 seconds before impact when the controller told the helicopter to "pass behind the CRJ" — may not have been received by the Black Hawk. That's because the helicopter crew was already making a radio transmission and part of what the controller said was interrupted and "stepped on," Homendy said.
  
  The crew of the American Airlines regional jet saw the helicopter about a second or two before impact. Homendy says the plane's pilots fully pulled the nose of the aircraft up about nine degrees just before impact. The crew of the helicopter, she said, continued flying mostly in the same direction and speed until the collision.
  
  She says it appears the helicopter crew was wearing night-vision goggles which are restrictive in what pilots can see. Homendy says the NTSB is planning to put together a full visual simulation of what the Black Hawk pilots would have been able to witness before the accident. "We're going to have to see what was possible for them to see at the time leading up to the collision and the accident sequence."
  
  The full NTSB investigation is expected to take at least a year.