21 ms·

Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

668 points by mzmzmzm 2y ago

ceejayoz 2y ago
Damn. We’ve avoided a US airliner having a fatal crash since 2009.
- drcode 2y ago
  It's a crazy accomplishment really, unimaginable how safe US commercial airplanes have been in the last two decades So sad that streak finally ended
  - techwizrd 2y ago
    As someone working in aviation safety, this is heartbreaking and awful to watch. The efforts of CAST and ASIAS in reducing aviation safety accidents have been very successful, but of course we still have so much to do.
  - whycome 2y ago
    There have been incidents that were just saved by luck (eg losing door in flight). And Too many near misses.
    - datadrivenangel 2y ago
      Better a near miss than a catastrophic incident.
  - chrismartin 2y ago
    And in such an avoidable way, too.
- idlewords 2y ago
  There was a fatality on a Southwest flight in 2018. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines_Flight_1380 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines_Flight_1380
  - okdood64 2y ago
    > fatal crash But yes, you're right to point that out.
    - idlewords 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - WillPostForFood 2y ago
        This might have been a better approach: It wasn't a crash, but there was a fatality on a Southwest flight in 2018.
      - HL33tibCe7 2y ago
        You are the one instigating the nerdfight
- ars 2y ago
  Not a US airliner, but in the US: Asiana Airlines Flight 214
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- SteveVeilStream 2y ago
  Although Air Canada Flight 759 was far too close for comfort and should be classified as a failure of the system, even if it did not result in an accident.
mzmzmzm 2y ago
A passenger jet originating from Kansas collided with a Blackhawk helicopter midair near Reagan National Airport on Wednesday night. Flights at the airport have been halted.
toomuchtodo 2y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Potomac_River_mid-air_collision https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Potomac_River_mid-air_col... https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-30/washington-airport-suspends-take-offs-landings-after-incident https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-30/washingto... | https://archive.today/n1ark https://archive.today/n1ark https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/plane-crash-dca-potomac-washington-dc-01-29-25/index.html https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/plane-crash-dca-potomac-was... (CNN live updates) https://old.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/1idbkyd/crash_at_dca/ https://old.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/1idbkyd/crash_at_dc... https://old.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/1idba8i/plane_crash_at_dca/ https://old.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/1idba8i/plane_cra... https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 https://archive.liveatc.net/kdca/KDCA1-Twr-Jan-30-2025-0130Z.mp3 https://archive.liveatc.net/kdca/KDCA1-Twr-Jan-30-2025-0130Z... | https://web.archive.org/web/20250130025411/https://archive.liveatc.net/kdca/KDCA1-Twr-Jan-30-2025-0130Z.mp3 https://web.archive.org/web/20250130025411/https://archive.l... (event starts at 17:25)
- LeoPanthera 2y ago
  BBC live updates: https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cy7kxx74yxlt https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cy7kxx74yxlt
- unsnap_biceps 2y ago
  https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/202501292000-281903-44114.mp3 https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/20250129200... contains the ATC feed in addition to the PAT-25 (helo) radio. ~5:41 mark 5342 is given instructions for circling to 33. ~6:45 mark PAT-25 reports Memorial ~7:06 mark tower gives PAT-25 traffic advisory about 5342 and PAT-25 reports traffic in sight and requests visual separation ~8:12 mark tower asks PAT-25 if they have the CRJ in sight. PAT-25 again reports traffic in sight and again requests visual separation. ~8:21 mark, crash occurs, exclamations, go arounds issued
  - htgb 2y ago
    I'm impressed by your, and their, hearing comprehension here! Granted, English isn't my native language but even with concentration I struggle to hear what they say.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
johnneville 2y ago
appears to have collided with a helicopter
lysace 2y ago
A CRJ700 crashing into a Black Hawk sounds bad. :/ FR24 shows helicopters from various agencies doing many laps around the site, presumably looking for survivors. https://i.imgur.com/SykzxUA.png https://i.imgur.com/SykzxUA.png
- pbronez 2y ago
  On the ATC radio archive you can hear the tower asking aircraft if they have lights, can the circle over the east side of the field to help locate survivors
nradov 2y ago
Obviously it will take some time for the full accident analysis but there have been quite a few near misses lately due to air traffic controller errors. Flight volume has been growing, airspace near airports is more congested, and controllers are overworked. Eventually all of the "Swiss cheese" holes line up. We're going to need to hire more controllers. Also, it appears that one of the aircraft was a military (not police) H-60 Blackhawk helicopter.
- paulddraper 2y ago
  I believe this happened in DC SFRA, which is a 30-mile radius specially controlled airspace due to the level of traffic and national security interests.
- readthenotes1 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
    If you listen to the ATC recording, around 15:50, they instruct the helicopter to watch for traffic, specifically this flight, and clears them for virtual separation. It's the helo's fault. They likely misjudged the plane due to assuming it was a large jet but it was a regional jet, so it was way closer than they thought it was. It's a tragedy, but I don't see how it would be ATC's fault. But that's just my 2 cents.
    - thallada 2y ago
      Do you have a link to the recording?
      - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
        It's linked in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42874330 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42874330 the liveatc link
    - 2y ago
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
readthenotes1 2y ago
The video makes it look like the helicopter crashed into the airplane, not the other way around.
- lysace 2y ago
  How do you figure? The videos of the crash that I can find on X just show a small airline light suddenly turning into a low-res explosion. (Edit: ah. yes.)
  - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
    there's a dot moving from the left to right that intercepts the airline lights and explodes. I would presume that's the helicopter.
  - hindsightbias 2y ago
    Its on final landing. The small light (helicopter) from the left intersects it.
  - cryptonector 2y ago
    https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 You see the helo coming from the left on the screen while the airliner appears to be descending. The helo must have gotten in the way (as opposed to catching up from behind). The airliner's lights are unmistakable, so how did the helo pilot not notice them? The airliner's pilots might not have had a chance to notice the helo. Since the helo was crossing an active runway approach the fault has to be with them.
    - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
      My only thought is that it's a regional jet, so it's smaller than a "normal" commercial flight. At night, if you expect it to be a big jet and it looks small, you presume it's just further away. I think they saw it, saw it small and presumed they had enough time to make it in front of it.
deadbabe 2y ago
Gruesome, in a crash like this, if there were any survivors from the impact, the water would likely have finished them off.
- whycome 2y ago
  If they can get out, they have a chance. There was a crash on the Potomac in January 1982 and there were several survivors. The video of the rescue is pretty crazy. https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/from-the-archives-heroes-pull-people-from-icy-potomac-after-1982-jet-crash/3513565/ https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/from-the-archives-h...
  - bfeynman 2y ago
    There was a truck that crashed on bridge right next to lincoln memorial and then veered off roadway into bridge, and both were deceased. Its very cold in DC right now and an airplane crashing is much more catastrophic.
    - jauntywundrkind 2y ago
      It was very cold in DC until recently but it's 45°F right now at 11:21. I was walking & biking around in a sports jacket today with a winter coat strapped onto the outside of my bag. Best wishes to the victims.
      - datadrivenangel 2y ago
        Potomac is half frozen still.
twoparachute45 2y ago
It wasn't a police chopper, it was a military VH-60, also known as a "White Hawk" [1]. It's a VIP transport helicopter, the same type that is used to transport the president. ~The flight track of the helicopter [2] starts at a property in McLean, VA (edited to remove likely inaccurate info)~ The chopper was based out of Fort Belvoir, and based on similar past flight tracks, looks like it probably took off from there too. CNN is reporting that there were 3 soldiers onboard, and no VIPs. 1: https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikorsky_VH-60N_White_Hawk https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikorsky_VH-60N_White_Hawk 2: https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d&lat=38.952&lon=-77.182&zoom=13.8&showTrace=2025-01-30 https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d&lat=38.952&lon=-...
- reaperman 2y ago
  [2] shows the helicopter taking off 2 miles away from the old saudi embassy in McLean marked “permanently closed” on google maps. (The current embassy is in DC proper, directly across the river from DCA airport) I don’t think thats strong evidence that it took off from the old Saudi Embassy - thats pretty far away even given your caveat about accuracy. Edit: it looks to me like the black hawk was coming from somewhere else with its ADS-B turned off entirely, and then turned on ADS-B once it reached the potomac to approach DCA. The first two datapoints of that flight already show it going 110mph, which its unlikely to be able to accelerate to in just 0.2miles after take off. Edit 2: The route also looks very similar to this flight from 11 days earlier (but reversed in direction): https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/PAT25 https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/PAT25 This shows the Blackhawk at 300 feet passing by DCA on what seems like a routine or training flight? I don't know how to look up historical flights to see if this is a commonly-flown route. On that flight, the Black Hawk flew past DCA at 300 feet of altitude, and the last FlightAware data for the American Eagle passenger flight showed 400 feet of altitude.
  - twoparachute45 2y ago
    I didn't say it took off from the old embassy. The flight track starts at the backyard of a house that is currently owned by the embassy. You can see the owner of that property by searching that address here (the site doesn't support a direct link): https://icare.fairfaxcounty.gov/ffxcare/search/commonsearch.aspx?mode=address https://icare.fairfaxcounty.gov/ffxcare/search/commonsearch....
reaperman 2y ago
Does anyone have the flight path for the helicopter? (Tail number PAT25). FlightAware doesn't show it but it might have been tracked by open source ADS-B receivers. This helicopter was often utilized for VIP transport.
- HeavenFox 2y ago
  https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d
  - chinathrow 2y ago
    Note: This is MLAT, not ADSB-Out data. https://skybrary.aero/articles/multilateration https://skybrary.aero/articles/multilateration
- nradov 2y ago
  PAT25 would be a temporary military flight call sign, not a tail number. US military aircraft don't have FAA "N" registration numbers like civilian aircraft do. Military aircraft do have official numbers but those aren't used for ATC or radio communications. In this particular case it appears that the "PAT" part is an acronym for Priority Air Travel. In other words, it was a VIP transport flight (there may not have been any VIPs actually on board at the time).
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
7thpower 2y ago
Oh man. I’m in Wichita and am getting a bunch of texts. Texted my friends that fly that route regularly and most have texted back. It can all be gone in an instant, tell those you love what they mean to you. edit: everyone is accounted for
- jeffhuys 2y ago
  > everyone is accounted for Happy to hear that.
  - 7thpower 2y ago
    Thank you!
bryant 2y ago
Not that being near DC affords me any kind of right to an opinion, but: Given the uptick in near miss incidents across the US the last few years, this is the kind of incident that should've been entirely avoidable through changes in policy from these past events but is also apparently the only kind that can spur along policy changes. I can see a world where the fault is on the VH-60, but absent more information, it would surprise me less to hear that it's the fault of the tower. Knowing where AA5342 was in its approach, I see no possibility of the jet being at fault. https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/AAL5342 https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/AAL5342 I'm drawing a lot of early conclusions but it's mostly because I'm just not surprised. Angry as someone who flies a bunch, but not surprised.
- unsnap_biceps 2y ago
  Regulations are written in blood, which is why it's such a disservice to indiscriminately tear it all down. We will re-learn the same lessons and people will pay for those lessons with their lives.
  - derektank 2y ago
    Some regulations are written and blood but some regulations are written to cover someone's ass and the two should not be treated equally. We shouldn't give equal respect to the Federal Aviation Regulations and to OPM's Qualification Standards for Federal Jobs; doing so deligitamizes the importance of the former.
    - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
      That's entirely true. Thank you for the correction. I spoke overly broadly.
    - rayiner 2y ago
      If everyone writing regulations were as rigorous as the FAA people wouldn’t be clamoring to reduce regulations.
sib301 2y ago
I just listened to the ATC recording from immediately before the collision. ATC instructs the helicopter to pass behind the CRJ. I’m fairly certain a few minutes before that, ATC instructed the helicopter to maintain visual separation, which is common. They typically ask, “do you have the aircraft in sight” and if you respond in the affirmative they rely on you to maintain safe distance. I should mention that in the recording you can only hear one side of the conversation, so I don’t know whether or not the helicopter said whether or not they had visual contact with the plane they collided with. Either way it doesn’t seem to be the fault of ATC. Of course we’ll know more as additional information becomes available.
- wyldfire 2y ago
  In the video from the webcam there's another plane which is much easier to see. Could they have asked about "the aircraft" and the helicopter pilot mistook which one they referred to? "yes I can see the plane flying much higher"
  - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
    It's possible but generally there's implied context to ATC. ATC would only instruct you to watch out for possible vector interceptions. flying over an approach path, the context would be that you would look for aircraft on approach, not ones in holding or other patterns above. That said, it's possible they mistook which aircraft to look for, but it's unlikely imho and we will likely never know for sure, as I would presume the pilots are deceased.
    - dylan604 2y ago
      I got a lesson in how ATC works with helicopters up close and personal on a helicopter tour. ATC had the helo pilot hold position while an airplane was on final approach. I asked the pilot why we needed to hold as we could clearly see the aircraft and were to my lack of knowledge on the subject "plenty" far away. (It actually took me a second to locate the airplane as my sense of scale was not expecting the plane to be so small which is part of why I made the assumption we were plenty far away.) That's when the pilot told me we were not in the way of the approach but if the pilot had to declare a miss (or whatever they call it) and climb to circle around. The helo was near the path for the plane on the abort flight path. Once the plane was on the ground, ATC allowed us to continue. It was my first experience in an aircraft seeing how ATC controlled the airspace directly. Lots of respect to the folks in ATC with a fraction of understanding in just how much they have to deal with other than the obvious take-off/landings.
anigbrowl 2y ago
[flagged]
- jonnybgood 2y ago
  > Given the strange way the helicopter appeared to fly right into the jet there will be no end to the speculation. There's an ATC recording. No speculation necessary. The Army helicopter pilot is likely at fault.
  - anigbrowl 2y ago
    If you think a recording of ATC saying 'keep an eye out for that plane coming in to land' is going to end speculation then you have no understanding of how people behave on social media. For some reason people are upset about me pointing out the reality that this will generate lots of conspiracy theories. I invite you to consider this example of a prominent public figure engaging in exactly the sort of speculation I described. https://bsky.app/profile/yasharali.bsky.social/post/3lgwrcvzjaz2z https://bsky.app/profile/yasharali.bsky.social/post/3lgwrcvz...
    - justinspace 2y ago
      Are you speaking from experience?
      - anigbrowl 2y ago
        Yes, I research and write on extremists and have become depressingly familiar with conspiratorial narrative formation in real time, as well having read a huge number of research papers into social media dynamics. I used to spend a lot of time and effort debunking CTs but frankly it seems increasingly pointless to do so nowadays.
        netsharc 2y ago
        Your first sentence, being startled to learn about remote-controlled flying, gives the impression that you're one of those conspiracy theory hobbyists (a term I'm conjuring for idjits who speculate conspiracies when anything happens)...
stall84 2y ago
In any event, unless the weather was IMC, where neither aircraft can see because of weather/cloud, which I'm deducing is not the case if they were allowed to maintain visual separation, the ultimate responsibility for maintaining separation is with the pilot(s) .. But as I posted, we should not have this happen anywhere in the United States in 2025 & much less the nation's capital. Hopefully DOT and FAA get to work, but I have a feeling that will be the end of DCA's usefull life as a major passenger airport.
- jfengel 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - jjtheblunt 2y ago
    > everyone is expecting to be fired regardless of their experience and skill. How do you know this?
    - SenHeng 2y ago
      Presumably because Trump just offered an 8month severance package to all fed workers. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o > US President Donald Trump has offered federal workers the option to resign and receive pay for eight months, in a major effort to shrink and reform the US government.
      - sarcasmatwork 2y ago
        [flagged]
        defrost 2y ago
        In the opinion of one person who has a grand total of zero minutes of experience of all US Gov. employees being offered resignation leters. The GP comment was about accident investigators rather than air traffic controllers but the consquences are the same, a lot of regular gov. employees are distracted by a current situation with no prior occurrence.
hindsightbias 2y ago
I believe the Marine aviation unit supporting the WH operates from the navy base east across from DCA. You can watch them training from the terminal. Not sure how they or the Army transition the approach ends to the runways, but it’s really close.
duxup 2y ago
I sometimes wonder about the value of these news stories on forums and social media. It's all pretty much wild speculation with several potential causes already mentioned on this forum. News important yes, every rando with a few shreds of factoids speculating, not so much.
- g-nair 2y ago
  I’ve been saying something similar to friends recently. We have access to a bit Too much news for our own good.
- throwaway2037 2y ago
  Anything about civilian air safety is like catnip for nerds. It is the ultimate armchair nerd sport -- speculating about reasons for a civilian air crash. I guess this discussion will be more than 1,000 comments before its heat-death.
- readyplayernull 2y ago
  Let's go back to AI non-stop 24/7, hallucinations are saner.
- fullshark 2y ago
  In this case there is no or negative value. Wait for the facts, avoid the noise and wild speculation.
  - avs733 2y ago
    But my dopamine…
- fortran77 2y ago
  Don't you know? If a person can program in Rust and Kotlin, that makes him an expert in every other field, too.
  - justinspace 2y ago
    I've seen at least one "why don't you just <misunderstanding of how aviation works>" upthread already. Can't believe this flavor of tech hubris is running the country now. No wonder the goddamn planes are falling out of the sky...
stall84 2y ago
We really can't have this type of accident, a midair collision happen anywhere in the United States, much less the nation's capital, especially considering the Washington area is some of the highest controlled airspace in the country. DCA has been a high-risk airport really since the jet-age, and I have a feeling this might be the end of it as a major passenger airport (at least for Part 121 operations). DOT/FAA are really going to need to step up after this and figure it out, for good. I hope there are survivors but it is really cold in that water right now, look up Air Florida flight 90 for a completely different accident, but in a similar time of the year.
- alsodumb 2y ago
  Unfortunately it's not gonna happen. The traffic at DCA only keeps going up, and I've heard chatter that it's because a lot of congressman and senators prefer taking flights from DCA instead of driving to Dulles or BWI.
  - yieldcrv 2y ago
    Cities should have convenient airports Maybe the evtol technology will alleviate this dilemma
- modriano 2y ago
  > DOT/FAA are really going to need to step up after this and figure it out, for good. Yeah. First, we should fill the currently vacant US Secretary of Transportation role. Then we should fill the currently vacant FAA Administrator role. Then we should fill the FAA Deputy Administrator role [0]. Then we should fill the currently vacant DoT Inspector General role that Trump just opened up by illegally firing this watchdog without the required 30 days notice to Congress [1]. Then we can start investigating. [0] https://web.archive.org/web/20250129122818/https://www.faa.gov/about/key_officials https://web.archive.org/web/20250129122818/https://www.faa.g... [1] https://www.govexec.com/oversight/2025/01/trump-fires-multiple-agency-inspectors-general/402504/ https://www.govexec.com/oversight/2025/01/trump-fires-multip...
- Axsuul 2y ago
  We’ve gone this long without an accident, what’s to say we’re not gonna learn the hard lesson from this and make sure it doesn’t happen again?
tjohns 2y ago
Radar replay: https://x.com/avgeekjake/status/1884823071611363833 https://x.com/avgeekjake/status/1884823071611363833 UHF feed with comms from the military helicopter: https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/202501292000-281903-44114.mp3 https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/20250129200... - 5:41 - AA5342 is given instructions for circling to 33 - 6:45 - PAT-25 reports Memorial - 7:06 - Tower gives PAT-25 traffic advisory, PAT-25 reports traffic in sight and requests visual separation - 8:08 - Tower asks PAT-25 if they have the CRJ in sight. PAT-25 again reports traffic in sight and again requests visual separation - 8:23 - Crash occurs
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- jakeogh 2y ago
  aaand.. it's gone. archive of the radar replay: https://dpaste.com/3DUG9YWFB https://dpaste.com/3DUG9YWFB sha3-256: 539b49e57443109cb0aea06209ce142d44a5ccbee16e42e0c71026742fc56703
  - smcin 2y ago
    No, the Twitter/X post is gone but the archives.broadcastify.com link is still good.
- jakeogh 2y ago
  more: https://dpaste.com/HDBW79JMX https://dpaste.com/HDBW79JMX (no height data, so I ignore the overlay comments on the first video) sha3-256's 7c608babe5552ac436499978b1a458b3a74ddc7e1d7e5011c6573b724729149e 24a3e23aa97f348ebd8740af83b3b50ae7dd5cd5147e88636b564e93d99d9775 blancolirio: Potomac Mid Air Collision DCA 1/29/25 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouDAnO8eMf8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouDAnO8eMf8
jauntywundrkind 2y ago
Anecdotally, the amount of helicopter & air traffic going on around DC has been absurd this month. My house in DC has calmed down some but we had a bunch of low flying fighters jets & helicopters for a bit. It's been wild having the house shaken at noon or 1:00 from pairs of fighter jets! I've had an in-week around Tysons this week, and it's been wild seeing pair after pair after pair of helicopter flying east towards the city this week. I'm normally up there once or twice a week and usually there's nothing like this.
- zzleeper 2y ago
  Agreed. Why so many heli's to McClean? Are they just too stingy to pay the I66 toll in the afternoon?
xunil2ycom 2y ago
[flagged]
- foogazi 2y ago
  Went on Reddit and them came here
- drekipus 2y ago
  always was
gonzo41 2y ago
I know that everyone crosses all altitudes during landing. But why don't ATC / FAA stratify aircraft type and use by altitude. Like all commercial traffic is put in even thousands altitudes. And the Military / EMS gets the odd thousands. Its crazy to have things colliding like this.
- mbreese 2y ago
  Everything eventually needs to land, so when you’re talking about an area around an airport, at low altitudes, that’s going to be a difficult thing to do. If you mix in helicopter traffic that needs to run at lower altitudes anyway, that is also near an airport, it becomes a much more difficult scenario to control.
- dboreham 2y ago
  Helicopter flies at 200ft. Planes landing have to traverse through 200ft. Therefore vertical separation impossible.
  - chinathrow 2y ago
    This heli route is just crazy.
    - dboreham 2y ago
      Agreed. Seems that underlying all of this is "people doing inadvisable things because they can".
    - chinathrow 2y ago
      Update: Found the routes in the FAA HELDC PDF https://aeronav.faa.gov/visual/12-26-2024/PDFs/Balt-Wash_Heli.pdf https://aeronav.faa.gov/visual/12-26-2024/PDFs/Balt-Wash_Hel...
- alsodumb 2y ago
  Route 4 (the helicopter route along the river) has a maximum altitude of 200 feet for helicopter. From the crash it seemed like the helicopter pilot wasn't strictly following the ceiling.
mmaunder 2y ago
This will be the worst disaster since Colgan in 2009 which is the crash that upped the hours requirement for ATP pilots from 250 to 1500 even though both pilots had over 1500 hours. I think this is going to be a very big deal and very quickly become a political football. Regardless, this is absolutely awful and extremely unfortunate.
- teractiveodular 2y ago
  Early indications are that the airliner and ATC were operating as planned, and the immediate cause of the crash was the military helicopter.
- lovecg 2y ago
  This is an often repeated misconception. ATP always needed 1500 hours. What wasn’t required is for both pilots to have an ATP, just the captain - the flight officer only needed a commercial certificate. Airlines would hire with lower hours and train on the job. While both pilots in the crash did have over 1500 hours, the flight officer did not in fact hold an ATP. The rule also changed some of the ATP training requirements, and there were other regulation changes on duty cycles, etc. It’s very possible we’ve had a run of good luck since 2009. It’s also possible some of the rule changes helped. I wouldn’t dismiss that possibility too quickly. https://www.faa.gov/documentlibrary/media/notice/n_8900.225.pdf https://www.faa.gov/documentlibrary/media/notice/n_8900.225....
third_rate_econ 2y ago
Could be a relevant DEFCON talk: https://youtu.be/KYuBf2HpXJg?si=srOl5T6CY6Lg8HZQ https://youtu.be/KYuBf2HpXJg?si=srOl5T6CY6Lg8HZQ Sounds like maybe the ADSB was on in this case though.
blondie9x 2y ago
[flagged]
- greenavocado 2y ago
  Trump is fully responsible for plane crashes /s
theGnuMe 2y ago
Maybe the military shouldn’t fly training flights there. Just an idea.
- warner25 2y ago
  It's a bad idea. That unit's [1] task is to provide transportation to senior government officials and security forces around the capital, including to and from that airport. If they didn't train to operate there, then their first time doing so would be with someone like the Secretary of Defense onboard or during some other mission that's critical to national security. "Training" here also doesn't imply some 21 year-old flight school student learning to fly. The aviators assigned to that unit are typically more senior people who've already done a tour or two with more conventional units. I've lost count of how many times I've heard your sentiment already today, and I'm distraught by the general public's apparent lack of understanding about how things work. [1] https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/ https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/
  - theGnuMe 2y ago
    I am appalled with your opinion. If the system can’t be safely designed with a safe margin of error then it is too dangerous. There are alternative ways and locations to train. If there’s a nat sec issue have the planes hold.
    - warner25 2y ago
      The missions are flown through that airspace multiple times per day, and it's all for national security purposes. You can't put a hold on all commercial air traffic every time, and you need to train the pilots to navigate and communicate through that particular airspace. Whether the system (i.e. separating rotary-wing and fixed-wing traffic there) can be more safely designed is a question for the FAA. The military aircraft are simply abiding by FAA rules for that airspace. Many more civilian helicopters are doing the same thing.
dmtroyer 2y ago
Are pilots landing at DCA conditioned to ignore TCAS warnings on approach? Would there have been one?
- GaryNumanVevo 2y ago
  TCAS has a minimum altitude of 700ft AFAIK
  - inoffensivename 2y ago
    It's 900ft AGL and below while descending (CRJ pilot here)
teractiveodular 2y ago
To put this in perspective, this is the first fatal crash of a US commercial airliner in 16 years (Colgan Air Flight 3407 on February 12, 2009) and the first fatal commercial airliner crash in the United States in 12 years (since Asiana Airlines Flight 214 on July 6, 2013). We like to throw shade at Boeing, the FAA etc, but this is still an incredible accomplishment, especially given the explosive growth of traffic over those years. Back in the 1970s and 1980s, there were far fewer flights but multiple crashes every year was the norm.
- cameldrv 2y ago
  That was my thought exactly when I heard of this. I trust that like other major accidents, that we will learn from this and make the skies safer. Sixteen years without a major airline crash was an incredible accomplishment. It's a tragedy it couldn't have gone on longer.
- OtherShrezzing 2y ago
  I think Boeing specifically attracts criticism due to all the fatalities outside of the US in that time period.
  - gota 2y ago
    And the perceived sentiment that those fatalities are directly linked to changes in the corporate culture that emphasized 'greed' and 'middle management power structures' over 'engineering focus' Not saying these are true - or false - just that the prevalent media coverage and social media commentary (including here on HN) has been touching on these points frequently. The 'good guys' at Boeing were pushed out or silenced, the 'sleazy guys' won and didn't care about the consequences as long as they got their payday
- junaru 2y ago
  Why is this being framed as airliners fault to begin with. When a fishingboat gets rammed by an cruise ship it's not "cruise ship collides with fishingboat", its the reverse. One is a big civilian aircraft thats being tracked and has no way of making sharp course adjustments the other is a 'VIP' with potentially ADS-B off. Heads should fly at whatever military branch the hellicopter was operated at... but they wont.
user_7832 2y ago
It’s probably really early to ask, but in case anyone here is knowledgeable and has any idea: why didn’t TCAS help avoid the accident? Isn’t it designed for such situations where 2 aircrafts collide? Do military crafts not have it or something?
- kristjansson 2y ago
  Too low, most likely.
- whataguy 2y ago
  It’s likely both the helicopter and the jet received a TCAS warning. In dense airspaces, those alerts tend to trigger frequently, so there’s a strong chance they may have dismissed it. The CRJ crew might have been aware of the Blackhawk’s presence, but if the other crew had visual contact with the approaching traffic (the CRJ), they might not have felt the need to take further action.
  - m2fkxy 2y ago
    TCAS RAs are inhibited at low altitude.
    - dboreham 2y ago
      I've seen this comment widely. But...why doesn't TCAS show the pilots at least as much information as I would have seen on my phone if I'd been browsing flightradar at the time? It's one thing to design a system with "don't saturate the operator with audible alerts" but another to say that it's appropriate to withhold very valuable information from the operator ("there are loads of planes in the general vicinity, but yeah look at that one coming at you from the left").
      - m2fkxy 2y ago
        the TCAS data would have been displayed. but not on instruments or in any place that you typically pay attention to the most during final visual approach (ie., mostly outside).
windowshopping 2y ago
The real question, I feel, is whether the current U.S. government as it exists in 2025 is still capable of continuing to improve things, and whether it's still putting all the lessons of the past into practice - or whether we were just coasting on a combination of luck and the vestigial safety left to us by the diligence of the past.
- LeoPanthera 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - insane_dreamer 2y ago
    nothing new there
- tmountain 2y ago
  The current administration wants to burn it all down and doesn’t carry any reverence or appreciation for past accomplishments or prior work.
- venusenvy47 2y ago
  Considering that the head of the FAA and TSA were forced to resign, and a hiring freeze on air traffic controllers is suddenly in effect, I don't think the current government wants to improve flight safety. https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2025-01-22/flurry-white-house-actions-reaching-aviation https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2025-0...
  - contravariant 2y ago
    Honestly I'm expecting an executive order banning left wings at this rate.
  - AdamN 2y ago
    Reagan fired the ATCs when they tried to assert their rights - can't be good if they think they may be the next in line for DOGEing.
RA_Fisher 2y ago
Another horrible cost of militarism.
modriano 2y ago
[flagged]
- Dalewyn 2y ago
  I'm going to head this off right now: This was between the pilots of the American Airlines flight and the Blackhawk, and the ATC at Reagan. Short of the controllers being literally understaffed, which I assume is not the case, the focus of this investigation should be what the sincere hell happened in the air there. This was a wholly preventable incident, hell this should have not happened period. Something likely very basic and fundamental failed catastrophically, and we need to figure out what and why. Bringing politics into this at this stage is unnecessary and deleterious noise unless findings implicating politics come to light.
  - modriano 2y ago
    Yeah, it's just a mountain of coherent circumstantial evidence at this point. We can infer that liquidation of leadership and oversight in the agencies responsible for the safety of air travel might distract and strain remaining operational staff, but we don't know for a fact yet that that's the case. Maybe we'll find that all relevant pilots, air traffic controllers, maintenance people, etc were all completely insulated from and oblivious to the active public campaign to eliminate their roles including the emails they would have received on Tuesday from the US Govt Office of Personnel Management [0]. I really don't see a way to eliminate Trump's chaos as at least a partial cause, and it could only be ruled out if the investigators are cognizant of political context. [0] https://www.opm.gov/fork https://www.opm.gov/fork
rich_sasha 2y ago
Maybe not related at all, but I can't help but wonder if this is affected by the funding turmoil. Would a less distracted ATC controller prevent this?
- fastball 2y ago
  No.
snowwrestler 2y ago
DCA has two runways. The longer runway is aligned with the river’s north/south direction at that point, so planes flying the approach to this runway from the south track along the western shore of the river, leaving the eastern shore clear for other aircraft like helicopters. The vast majority of flights on approach from the south [1] use this longer runway. The secondary runway is set at a diagonal NW/SE. Planes flying an approach from the south follow the river at first, but then loop out over the eastern shore of the river to line up on that runway. To my eye the radar track of the downed flight follows this path. It’s possible since it was a small plane and only small planes can use the diagonal runway—it’s shorter. I mention this because this track takes planes into airspace that is a) usually clear of commercial airplane traffic, and b) directly over military facilities like Naval Research Lab and Joint Base Bolling, which have significant military helicopter travel. Basically, I wonder to what extent the helicopter pilot was surprised to find an airplane descending in that location. [1] When flights are approaching from the north, the main runway requires a pretty sharp right turn seconds before touching down. Approaches to the diagonal runway from the north take planes almost directly over the Pentagon.
- Molitor5901 2y ago
  The press conference this morning mentioned that this was a new flight path. I wonder if the helicopter crew were not fully briefed on the new path, if that is the case.
- francisofascii 2y ago
  In looking at the radar recording, the plane appears to be approaching from the south going north (very slightly east), than diverts northwest to land on the runway, as you describe.
- GlenTheMachine 2y ago
  I work at NRL, east of DCA and about 500 yards south of the crash. Can confirm that it is not unusual for flights to pass directly overhead of us, however I don’t understand the statement that this was a new flight path.
  - 2y ago
vman81 2y ago
If anyone needs a palate cleanser after listening to a depressing ATC recording, I can recommend this heartwarming first time solo flying teenager dealing with her landing gear coming off after takeoff. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZ5q7Iv5wTM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZ5q7Iv5wTM
- dibujaron 2y ago
  This was great, thanks!
- Reubachi 2y ago
  The amount of times i've wtched this video needing an excuse to feel hype is greater than 10. Her personal instructor finally arriving ("Maggie it's john") and Maggie starting to normalize the situation/making professonal raido calls really show the power of humanity working through struggle.
- kirtakat 2y ago
  Gods, her "OK" at 30seconds is fucking heart wrenching.
  - Sohcahtoa82 2y ago
    The absolute terror she must have felt. All she could probably think of was that she was not going to survive that flight. Though it sounds like she successfully landed it without any injury.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- coryfklein 2y ago
  Thank you so much for sharing this. Probably the most wholesome, scary, heartening thing I've seen this year.
- bolognafairy 2y ago
  I’ve watched this countless times and I’ll watch it countless times more.
wnevets 2y ago
Whose idea was it to gut aviation safety?
outside1234 2y ago
The Boeing-ification of the federal government, in which everything is stripped down to below what is actually required to be safe, is in full effect.
nycdatasci 2y ago
AV Herald has a great summary and discussion: https://avherald.com/h?article=52374362&opt=0 https://avherald.com/h?article=52374362&opt=0
hammock 2y ago
I was a controller at DCA for 8 years and this is a normal operation with Helicopters using the Helicopter routes. The problem I see is the controller asked the Helicopter if they had the CRJ in sight, but he never said WHERE HE WAS OR WHAT HE WAS DOING! The controller should have told the Helicopter that the CRJ was circling to RWY 33. The helicopter said he had him in sight, but he really had the Jet in sight that was landing on RWY 1. Had the controller told him: Traffic ahead and to your left landing runway 33 is a CRJ report him in sight, then the helicopter crew would have LOOKED to their left and saw him. They unfortunately were looking straight ahead at a different plane. The controller is going to take a major blame for this one unfortunately for not being more detailed. Those Helicopters literally fly directly in the path of those RWY 33 arrivals so as a controller you have to be EXACT!!!! Another problem I see is the expectation bias. As controllers in that scenario, we want to hear the Helicopter say "traffic in sight and we will maintain Visual Separation. These Helicopter Pilots know we need to hear them say that (it's required), so they will say this just because even though they might not really have the aircraft in sight. They are just saying what we want to hear. If they don't, then we stop their forward progress or make them turn out. Comment from instagram
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- deadbabe 2y ago
  The controller will not take blame. It is a blameless culture where mistakes are expected and analyzed and learned from.
  - hammock 2y ago
    Agree with this
  - bayarearefugee 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - recursive 2y ago
GlenTheMachine 2y ago
I work at a Navy installation on the Potomac just south of DCA. As of 10 am EST today there was a moderate police and rescue presence on the water. There is a significant amount of debris visible floating in the river, and the boats are fishing it out piece by piece. The only things in the air are a handful of helicopters, presumably related to the search operation.
r00fus 2y ago
I wonder if this administration's firing of many FAA civil positions and the federal worker "buyouts" are responsible.
- rapnie 2y ago
  Just learned about it here: https://fallows.substack.com/p/it-had-been-16-years-since-a-fatal https://fallows.substack.com/p/it-had-been-16-years-since-a-... Likely more affected are learning about the aftermath via investigation, but I am not sure. Edit: No wait, that article mentioned the disbanding of Aviation Security Advisory Committee a week ago.
- JadoJodo 2y ago
  I'll bite. How are you thinking that might've contributed to the crash?
- davidw 2y ago
  The intelligent response would be "probably not, but we'll see what the investigation says". But imagine if the tables were turned politically. Fox News would be going off 24/7 about "DEI" or some such for weeks on end. That strategy seems to be successful, so I would expect the other side to start employing it more as well. Having a bunch of harried, overworked people stressed about their jobs and the future certainly doesn't help anything, in any case.
  - TheGRS 2y ago
    Yea I had the same thought, its a ticky-tacky thing to say right now, but I wouldn't expect any more from the other side either.
    - davidw 2y ago
      And there it is. He's out there saying it right now.
      - TheGRS 2y ago
TheRealPomax 2y ago
"Commercial jet collides with helicopter during landing", while not the article title, would be far more accurate.
Yeul 2y ago
"Trump blames diversity rules under his predecessors, saying he believes people were hired for air traffic control roles who were not qualified - but offers no evidence for this" From the BBC. I swear to god they made 4chan president of America.
- okvariation2323 2y ago
  There is some evidence for this, unfortunately https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-a-quick-overview https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-...
  - rexpop 2y ago
    Thank you for this. I'm still convinced that evidence of DEI is not evidence of its culpability. The real "affirmative action" is the coddling of white men from birth to job placement, while women and POC are deprived of equal opportunities. These assessment discrepancies are negligible. DEI is a red herring.
throw0101c 2y ago
"FAA Got Rid of Its Leader Before D.C. Plane Crash—Thanks to Elon Musk": * https://newrepublic.com/post/190942/faa-no-leader-dc-plane-crash-elon-musk https://newrepublic.com/post/190942/faa-no-leader-dc-plane-c... "FAA Administrator Quit on Jan. 20 After Elon Musk Told Him to Resign": * https://www.thedailybeast.com/faa-chief-michael-whitaker-quit-on-jan-20-after-elon-musk-told-him-to-resign/ https://www.thedailybeast.com/faa-chief-michael-whitaker-qui... "The FAA is facing a major crisis without a leader because Elon Musk pushed him out* * https://www.theverge.com/news/603113/faa-chief-musk-dc-plane-crash-crisis https://www.theverge.com/news/603113/faa-chief-musk-dc-plane...
- dehrmann 2y ago
  If we see more accidents a year from now, you have a point. The most you can really blame on leadership changes right now is stress from worrying about your next paycheck. Even then, this looks like a military pilot screwed up doing a routine training exercise.
  - dboreham 2y ago
    Probably, but that pilot was it seems operating within a very risky environment (being able to see and avoid a plane in the dark in a place with many such planes and other lighted objects) that with hindsight should not have existed. I'd certainly never have flown on a plane into DCA if I had known that military helicopters were routinely buzzing around in the same airspace with no technological deconfliction aids.
  - fundad 2y ago
    It's important to consider what the administration was focused on during a life-or-death crisis.
- CivBase 2y ago
  Gotta find a way to blame every tragedy on the politicians we don't like, huh? Trump is out there blaming Biden's administration for hiring bad ATC under the banner of DEI. Meanwhile, his detractors blame him and Musk for letting go of some FAA administrator. But of couse neither of those explanations are likely to hold water. The sad, mundane reality is these people probably lost their lives due to a miscommunication or misunderstanding between ATC and the helicopter pilots. And this political mudslinging will probably get in the way of us ever implementing process changes so it doesn't happen again.
JTbane 2y ago
Real talk, the helicopter was operating night VFR, right? How is this safe when the jet is moving extremely fast relative to the chopper and the only separation is a visual reference to some navigation lights?
- alistairSH 2y ago
  Right or wrong, the US has fewer (but not quite zero) limits on night-time VFR. This differs from some of the EU, where night VFR can have more stringent operating parameters than day-time VFR.
- jahewson 2y ago
  It’s not. That’s the simple answer. Accident waiting to happen.
gepardi 2y ago
Why is a Blackhawk helicopter Performing a “training flight” at night very close to DCA?
- RandomBacon 2y ago
  Presumably because they might have to fly a regular flight at night very close to DCA? Imagine if there was VIP onboard, especially if it was foreign VIP.
- kube-system 2y ago
  Because DCA is right beside a couple of military bases, the headquarters of the US military, and the political capital of the US. These helicopters are always going up and down the Potomac all the time.
- alistairSH 2y ago
  I'm pretty sure "training flight" in this context simply means they weren't actively carrying passengers. And it's not indicative of a junior or unqualified pilot (doesn't rule it out, just can't infer much from the phrase in this context). At the extreme, fighter pilots fly almost exclusively training flights because we're not actively waging war at the moment. There are a few military bases in the area - Belvior (Army), Quantico (USMC), Andrews (USAF), Pentagon, and some smaller ones (some of which have helipads, but no helicopters on station). And lots of shuttling of DoD and other government VIPs from location to location across the DC metro area.
  - warner25 2y ago
    Yes, the public needs to understand this. That unit's [1] task is to provide transportation to senior government officials and security forces around the capital, including to and from that airport. If they didn't train to operate there, then their first time doing so would be with someone like the Secretary of Defense onboard or during some other mission that's critical to national security. And the aviators assigned to that unit are typically more senior people who've already done a tour or two with more conventional units. Source: I'm a career Army officer and former Black Hawk pilot. [1] https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/ https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/
kranke155 2y ago
A real tragedy. Here on HN someone mentioned after a recent (last year) near miss that the US system was overloading the system and that some tragedy might be incoming. Maybe of the most insightful and heart breaking “competency crisis” related posts I’ve encountered.
kjellsbells 2y ago
Sad all round, and I hope that the NTSB, who are pretty good at getting to the bottom of things without getting into finger pointing, will do so. That said, DC airspace is complicated as hell. You've got very heavily restricted airspace over the city immediately east. VIP natsec/military base facilities on the other side of the Potomac. There are major highways to the north, west, and south of all the approaches. The standard route and safety corridor is along the Potomac river, which is heavily trafficked at all altitudes, with commercial, law enforcement, military, and VIP transport. The CIA is 5 miles up the river and is hardly gonna thank you for dropping out of the sky with no notice. Not an easy place to fly.
zombiwoof 2y ago
I'm sorry, doesn't matter who you support, but to blame DEI or former presidents for this is just shameful.
- firdunupsa 2y ago
  [flagged]
- sirbutters 2y ago
  And yet, completely unsurprising. I know there is no limit to how low this pathetic human being can go.
- TrackerFF 2y ago
  DEI is the new catch-all boogeyman. My take is that the emperor has no clothes, and most people around him are simply too afraid to say anything. The rest have something to gain from his current anti-DEI fixation. I fully expect Trump to blame every future scandal, accident, crisis, etc. on DEI.
- sg47 2y ago
  The Trump killings have started
- stevenwoo 2y ago
  They found a new scapegoat. They blame public employees, they just advised all air traffic controllers to find a job in the private sector after this crash. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/31/us/politics/federal-workers-opm.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/31/us/politics/federal-worke...
andyjohnson0 2y ago
PPRUNE has a long thread about the accident at [1]. Usual mixture of perspectives, mostly well informed I think. [1] https://www.pprune.org/accidents-close-calls/663888-aa5342-down-dca-15.html https://www.pprune.org/accidents-close-calls/663888-aa5342-d...
Slava_Propanei 2y ago
[dead]
sega_sai 2y ago
For the record: January 20: FAA director fired January 21: Air Traffic Controller hiring freeze January 22: Aviation Safety Advisory Committee disbanded January 28: Buyout/retirement demand sent to existing employees

668 points by mzmzmzm 2y ago

ceejayoz 2y ago

Damn. We’ve avoided a US airliner having a fatal crash since 2009.

drcode 2y ago
It's a crazy accomplishment really, unimaginable how safe US commercial airplanes have been in the last two decades So sad that streak finally ended
- techwizrd 2y ago
  As someone working in aviation safety, this is heartbreaking and awful to watch. The efforts of CAST and ASIAS in reducing aviation safety accidents have been very successful, but of course we still have so much to do.
- whycome 2y ago
  There have been incidents that were just saved by luck (eg losing door in flight). And Too many near misses.
  - datadrivenangel 2y ago
    Better a near miss than a catastrophic incident.
- chrismartin 2y ago
  And in such an avoidable way, too.
idlewords 2y ago
There was a fatality on a Southwest flight in 2018. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines_Flight_1380 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southwest_Airlines_Flight_1380
- okdood64 2y ago
  > fatal crash But yes, you're right to point that out.
  - idlewords 2y ago
    [flagged]
    - WillPostForFood 2y ago
      This might have been a better approach: It wasn't a crash, but there was a fatality on a Southwest flight in 2018.
    - HL33tibCe7 2y ago
      You are the one instigating the nerdfight
ars 2y ago
Not a US airliner, but in the US: Asiana Airlines Flight 214
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
SteveVeilStream 2y ago
Although Air Canada Flight 759 was far too close for comfort and should be classified as a failure of the system, even if it did not result in an accident.

mzmzmzm 2y ago

A passenger jet originating from Kansas collided with a Blackhawk helicopter midair near Reagan National Airport on Wednesday night. Flights at the airport have been halted.

toomuchtodo 2y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Potomac_River_mid-air_collision https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_Potomac_River_mid-air_col... https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-30/washington-airport-suspends-take-offs-landings-after-incident https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2025-01-30/washingto... | https://archive.today/n1ark https://archive.today/n1ark https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/plane-crash-dca-potomac-washington-dc-01-29-25/index.html https://www.cnn.com/us/live-news/plane-crash-dca-potomac-was... (CNN live updates) https://old.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/1idbkyd/crash_at_dca/ https://old.reddit.com/r/flying/comments/1idbkyd/crash_at_dc... https://old.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/1idba8i/plane_crash_at_dca/ https://old.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/1idba8i/plane_cra... https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 https://archive.liveatc.net/kdca/KDCA1-Twr-Jan-30-2025-0130Z.mp3 https://archive.liveatc.net/kdca/KDCA1-Twr-Jan-30-2025-0130Z... | https://web.archive.org/web/20250130025411/https://archive.liveatc.net/kdca/KDCA1-Twr-Jan-30-2025-0130Z.mp3 https://web.archive.org/web/20250130025411/https://archive.l... (event starts at 17:25)

LeoPanthera 2y ago
BBC live updates: https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cy7kxx74yxlt https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cy7kxx74yxlt
unsnap_biceps 2y ago
https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/202501292000-281903-44114.mp3 https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/20250129200... contains the ATC feed in addition to the PAT-25 (helo) radio. ~5:41 mark 5342 is given instructions for circling to 33. ~6:45 mark PAT-25 reports Memorial ~7:06 mark tower gives PAT-25 traffic advisory about 5342 and PAT-25 reports traffic in sight and requests visual separation ~8:12 mark tower asks PAT-25 if they have the CRJ in sight. PAT-25 again reports traffic in sight and again requests visual separation. ~8:21 mark, crash occurs, exclamations, go arounds issued
- htgb 2y ago
  I'm impressed by your, and their, hearing comprehension here! Granted, English isn't my native language but even with concentration I struggle to hear what they say.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

johnneville 2y ago

appears to have collided with a helicopter

lysace 2y ago

A CRJ700 crashing into a Black Hawk sounds bad. :/ FR24 shows helicopters from various agencies doing many laps around the site, presumably looking for survivors. https://i.imgur.com/SykzxUA.png https://i.imgur.com/SykzxUA.png

pbronez 2y ago
On the ATC radio archive you can hear the tower asking aircraft if they have lights, can the circle over the east side of the field to help locate survivors

nradov 2y ago

Obviously it will take some time for the full accident analysis but there have been quite a few near misses lately due to air traffic controller errors. Flight volume has been growing, airspace near airports is more congested, and controllers are overworked. Eventually all of the "Swiss cheese" holes line up. We're going to need to hire more controllers. Also, it appears that one of the aircraft was a military (not police) H-60 Blackhawk helicopter.

paulddraper 2y ago
I believe this happened in DC SFRA, which is a 30-mile radius specially controlled airspace due to the level of traffic and national security interests.
readthenotes1 2y ago
[flagged]
- unsnap_biceps 2y ago
  If you listen to the ATC recording, around 15:50, they instruct the helicopter to watch for traffic, specifically this flight, and clears them for virtual separation. It's the helo's fault. They likely misjudged the plane due to assuming it was a large jet but it was a regional jet, so it was way closer than they thought it was. It's a tragedy, but I don't see how it would be ATC's fault. But that's just my 2 cents.
  - thallada 2y ago
    Do you have a link to the recording?
    - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
      It's linked in https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42874330 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42874330 the liveatc link
  - 2y ago

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

readthenotes1 2y ago

The video makes it look like the helicopter crashed into the airplane, not the other way around.

lysace 2y ago
How do you figure? The videos of the crash that I can find on X just show a small airline light suddenly turning into a low-res explosion. (Edit: ah. yes.)
- unsnap_biceps 2y ago
  there's a dot moving from the left to right that intercepts the airline lights and explodes. I would presume that's the helicopter.
- hindsightbias 2y ago
  Its on final landing. The small light (helicopter) from the left intersects it.
- cryptonector 2y ago
  https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 You see the helo coming from the left on the screen while the airliner appears to be descending. The helo must have gotten in the way (as opposed to catching up from behind). The airliner's lights are unmistakable, so how did the helo pilot not notice them? The airliner's pilots might not have had a chance to notice the helo. Since the helo was crossing an active runway approach the fault has to be with them.
  - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
    My only thought is that it's a regional jet, so it's smaller than a "normal" commercial flight. At night, if you expect it to be a big jet and it looks small, you presume it's just further away. I think they saw it, saw it small and presumed they had enough time to make it in front of it.

deadbabe 2y ago

Gruesome, in a crash like this, if there were any survivors from the impact, the water would likely have finished them off.

whycome 2y ago
If they can get out, they have a chance. There was a crash on the Potomac in January 1982 and there were several survivors. The video of the rescue is pretty crazy. https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/from-the-archives-heroes-pull-people-from-icy-potomac-after-1982-jet-crash/3513565/ https://www.nbcwashington.com/news/local/from-the-archives-h...
- bfeynman 2y ago
  There was a truck that crashed on bridge right next to lincoln memorial and then veered off roadway into bridge, and both were deceased. Its very cold in DC right now and an airplane crashing is much more catastrophic.
  - jauntywundrkind 2y ago
    It was very cold in DC until recently but it's 45°F right now at 11:21. I was walking & biking around in a sports jacket today with a winter coat strapped onto the outside of my bag. Best wishes to the victims.
    - datadrivenangel 2y ago
      Potomac is half frozen still.

twoparachute45 2y ago

It wasn't a police chopper, it was a military VH-60, also known as a "White Hawk" [1]. It's a VIP transport helicopter, the same type that is used to transport the president. ~The flight track of the helicopter [2] starts at a property in McLean, VA (edited to remove likely inaccurate info)~ The chopper was based out of Fort Belvoir, and based on similar past flight tracks, looks like it probably took off from there too. CNN is reporting that there were 3 soldiers onboard, and no VIPs. 1: https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikorsky_VH-60N_White_Hawk https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikorsky_VH-60N_White_Hawk 2: https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d&lat=38.952&lon=-77.182&zoom=13.8&showTrace=2025-01-30 https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d&lat=38.952&lon=-...

reaperman 2y ago
[2] shows the helicopter taking off 2 miles away from the old saudi embassy in McLean marked “permanently closed” on google maps. (The current embassy is in DC proper, directly across the river from DCA airport) I don’t think thats strong evidence that it took off from the old Saudi Embassy - thats pretty far away even given your caveat about accuracy. Edit: it looks to me like the black hawk was coming from somewhere else with its ADS-B turned off entirely, and then turned on ADS-B once it reached the potomac to approach DCA. The first two datapoints of that flight already show it going 110mph, which its unlikely to be able to accelerate to in just 0.2miles after take off. Edit 2: The route also looks very similar to this flight from 11 days earlier (but reversed in direction): https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/PAT25 https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/PAT25 This shows the Blackhawk at 300 feet passing by DCA on what seems like a routine or training flight? I don't know how to look up historical flights to see if this is a commonly-flown route. On that flight, the Black Hawk flew past DCA at 300 feet of altitude, and the last FlightAware data for the American Eagle passenger flight showed 400 feet of altitude.
- twoparachute45 2y ago
  I didn't say it took off from the old embassy. The flight track starts at the backyard of a house that is currently owned by the embassy. You can see the owner of that property by searching that address here (the site doesn't support a direct link): https://icare.fairfaxcounty.gov/ffxcare/search/commonsearch.aspx?mode=address https://icare.fairfaxcounty.gov/ffxcare/search/commonsearch....

reaperman 2y ago

Does anyone have the flight path for the helicopter? (Tail number PAT25). FlightAware doesn't show it but it might have been tracked by open source ADS-B receivers. This helicopter was often utilized for VIP transport.

HeavenFox 2y ago
https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d https://globe.adsbexchange.com/?icao=ae313d
- chinathrow 2y ago
  Note: This is MLAT, not ADSB-Out data. https://skybrary.aero/articles/multilateration https://skybrary.aero/articles/multilateration
nradov 2y ago
PAT25 would be a temporary military flight call sign, not a tail number. US military aircraft don't have FAA "N" registration numbers like civilian aircraft do. Military aircraft do have official numbers but those aren't used for ATC or radio communications. In this particular case it appears that the "PAT" part is an acronym for Priority Air Travel. In other words, it was a VIP transport flight (there may not have been any VIPs actually on board at the time).
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]

7thpower 2y ago

Oh man. I’m in Wichita and am getting a bunch of texts. Texted my friends that fly that route regularly and most have texted back. It can all be gone in an instant, tell those you love what they mean to you. edit: everyone is accounted for

jeffhuys 2y ago
> everyone is accounted for Happy to hear that.
- 7thpower 2y ago
  Thank you!

bryant 2y ago

Not that being near DC affords me any kind of right to an opinion, but: Given the uptick in near miss incidents across the US the last few years, this is the kind of incident that should've been entirely avoidable through changes in policy from these past events but is also apparently the only kind that can spur along policy changes. I can see a world where the fault is on the VH-60, but absent more information, it would surprise me less to hear that it's the fault of the tower. Knowing where AA5342 was in its approach, I see no possibility of the jet being at fault. https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/AAL5342 https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/AAL5342 I'm drawing a lot of early conclusions but it's mostly because I'm just not surprised. Angry as someone who flies a bunch, but not surprised.

unsnap_biceps 2y ago
Regulations are written in blood, which is why it's such a disservice to indiscriminately tear it all down. We will re-learn the same lessons and people will pay for those lessons with their lives.
- derektank 2y ago
  Some regulations are written and blood but some regulations are written to cover someone's ass and the two should not be treated equally. We shouldn't give equal respect to the Federal Aviation Regulations and to OPM's Qualification Standards for Federal Jobs; doing so deligitamizes the importance of the former.
  - unsnap_biceps 2y ago
    That's entirely true. Thank you for the correction. I spoke overly broadly.
  - rayiner 2y ago
    If everyone writing regulations were as rigorous as the FAA people wouldn’t be clamoring to reduce regulations.

sib301 2y ago

I just listened to the ATC recording from immediately before the collision. ATC instructs the helicopter to pass behind the CRJ. I’m fairly certain a few minutes before that, ATC instructed the helicopter to maintain visual separation, which is common. They typically ask, “do you have the aircraft in sight” and if you respond in the affirmative they rely on you to maintain safe distance. I should mention that in the recording you can only hear one side of the conversation, so I don’t know whether or not the helicopter said whether or not they had visual contact with the plane they collided with. Either way it doesn’t seem to be the fault of ATC. Of course we’ll know more as additional information becomes available.

wyldfire 2y ago
In the video from the webcam there's another plane which is much easier to see. Could they have asked about "the aircraft" and the helicopter pilot mistook which one they referred to? "yes I can see the plane flying much higher"
- unsnap_biceps 2y ago
  It's possible but generally there's implied context to ATC. ATC would only instruct you to watch out for possible vector interceptions. flying over an approach path, the context would be that you would look for aircraft on approach, not ones in holding or other patterns above. That said, it's possible they mistook which aircraft to look for, but it's unlikely imho and we will likely never know for sure, as I would presume the pilots are deceased.
  - dylan604 2y ago
    I got a lesson in how ATC works with helicopters up close and personal on a helicopter tour. ATC had the helo pilot hold position while an airplane was on final approach. I asked the pilot why we needed to hold as we could clearly see the aircraft and were to my lack of knowledge on the subject "plenty" far away. (It actually took me a second to locate the airplane as my sense of scale was not expecting the plane to be so small which is part of why I made the assumption we were plenty far away.) That's when the pilot told me we were not in the way of the approach but if the pilot had to declare a miss (or whatever they call it) and climb to circle around. The helo was near the path for the plane on the abort flight path. Once the plane was on the ground, ATC allowed us to continue. It was my first experience in an aircraft seeing how ATC controlled the airspace directly. Lots of respect to the folks in ATC with a fraction of understanding in just how much they have to deal with other than the obvious take-off/landings.

anigbrowl 2y ago

[flagged]

jonnybgood 2y ago
> Given the strange way the helicopter appeared to fly right into the jet there will be no end to the speculation. There's an ATC recording. No speculation necessary. The Army helicopter pilot is likely at fault.
- anigbrowl 2y ago
  If you think a recording of ATC saying 'keep an eye out for that plane coming in to land' is going to end speculation then you have no understanding of how people behave on social media. For some reason people are upset about me pointing out the reality that this will generate lots of conspiracy theories. I invite you to consider this example of a prominent public figure engaging in exactly the sort of speculation I described. https://bsky.app/profile/yasharali.bsky.social/post/3lgwrcvzjaz2z https://bsky.app/profile/yasharali.bsky.social/post/3lgwrcvz...
  - justinspace 2y ago
    Are you speaking from experience?
    - anigbrowl 2y ago
      Yes, I research and write on extremists and have become depressingly familiar with conspiratorial narrative formation in real time, as well having read a huge number of research papers into social media dynamics. I used to spend a lot of time and effort debunking CTs but frankly it seems increasingly pointless to do so nowadays.
      - netsharc 2y ago
        Your first sentence, being startled to learn about remote-controlled flying, gives the impression that you're one of those conspiracy theory hobbyists (a term I'm conjuring for idjits who speculate conspiracies when anything happens)...

stall84 2y ago

In any event, unless the weather was IMC, where neither aircraft can see because of weather/cloud, which I'm deducing is not the case if they were allowed to maintain visual separation, the ultimate responsibility for maintaining separation is with the pilot(s) .. But as I posted, we should not have this happen anywhere in the United States in 2025 & much less the nation's capital. Hopefully DOT and FAA get to work, but I have a feeling that will be the end of DCA's usefull life as a major passenger airport.

jfengel 2y ago
[flagged]
- jjtheblunt 2y ago
  > everyone is expecting to be fired regardless of their experience and skill. How do you know this?
  - SenHeng 2y ago
    Presumably because Trump just offered an 8month severance package to all fed workers. https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cnvqe3le3z4o > US President Donald Trump has offered federal workers the option to resign and receive pay for eight months, in a major effort to shrink and reform the US government.
    - sarcasmatwork 2y ago
      [flagged]
      - defrost 2y ago
        In the opinion of one person who has a grand total of zero minutes of experience of all US Gov. employees being offered resignation leters. The GP comment was about accident investigators rather than air traffic controllers but the consquences are the same, a lot of regular gov. employees are distracted by a current situation with no prior occurrence.

hindsightbias 2y ago

I believe the Marine aviation unit supporting the WH operates from the navy base east across from DCA. You can watch them training from the terminal. Not sure how they or the Army transition the approach ends to the runways, but it’s really close.

duxup 2y ago

I sometimes wonder about the value of these news stories on forums and social media. It's all pretty much wild speculation with several potential causes already mentioned on this forum. News important yes, every rando with a few shreds of factoids speculating, not so much.

g-nair 2y ago
I’ve been saying something similar to friends recently. We have access to a bit Too much news for our own good.
throwaway2037 2y ago
Anything about civilian air safety is like catnip for nerds. It is the ultimate armchair nerd sport -- speculating about reasons for a civilian air crash. I guess this discussion will be more than 1,000 comments before its heat-death.
readyplayernull 2y ago
Let's go back to AI non-stop 24/7, hallucinations are saner.
fullshark 2y ago
In this case there is no or negative value. Wait for the facts, avoid the noise and wild speculation.
- avs733 2y ago
  But my dopamine…
fortran77 2y ago
Don't you know? If a person can program in Rust and Kotlin, that makes him an expert in every other field, too.
- justinspace 2y ago
  I've seen at least one "why don't you just <misunderstanding of how aviation works>" upthread already. Can't believe this flavor of tech hubris is running the country now. No wonder the goddamn planes are falling out of the sky...

stall84 2y ago

We really can't have this type of accident, a midair collision happen anywhere in the United States, much less the nation's capital, especially considering the Washington area is some of the highest controlled airspace in the country. DCA has been a high-risk airport really since the jet-age, and I have a feeling this might be the end of it as a major passenger airport (at least for Part 121 operations). DOT/FAA are really going to need to step up after this and figure it out, for good. I hope there are survivors but it is really cold in that water right now, look up Air Florida flight 90 for a completely different accident, but in a similar time of the year.

alsodumb 2y ago
Unfortunately it's not gonna happen. The traffic at DCA only keeps going up, and I've heard chatter that it's because a lot of congressman and senators prefer taking flights from DCA instead of driving to Dulles or BWI.
- yieldcrv 2y ago
  Cities should have convenient airports Maybe the evtol technology will alleviate this dilemma
modriano 2y ago
> DOT/FAA are really going to need to step up after this and figure it out, for good. Yeah. First, we should fill the currently vacant US Secretary of Transportation role. Then we should fill the currently vacant FAA Administrator role. Then we should fill the FAA Deputy Administrator role [0]. Then we should fill the currently vacant DoT Inspector General role that Trump just opened up by illegally firing this watchdog without the required 30 days notice to Congress [1]. Then we can start investigating. [0] https://web.archive.org/web/20250129122818/https://www.faa.gov/about/key_officials https://web.archive.org/web/20250129122818/https://www.faa.g... [1] https://www.govexec.com/oversight/2025/01/trump-fires-multiple-agency-inspectors-general/402504/ https://www.govexec.com/oversight/2025/01/trump-fires-multip...
Axsuul 2y ago
We’ve gone this long without an accident, what’s to say we’re not gonna learn the hard lesson from this and make sure it doesn’t happen again?

tjohns 2y ago

Radar replay: https://x.com/avgeekjake/status/1884823071611363833 https://x.com/avgeekjake/status/1884823071611363833 UHF feed with comms from the military helicopter: https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/202501292000-281903-44114.mp3 https://archives.broadcastify.com/44114/20250129/20250129200... - 5:41 - AA5342 is given instructions for circling to 33 - 6:45 - PAT-25 reports Memorial - 7:06 - Tower gives PAT-25 traffic advisory, PAT-25 reports traffic in sight and requests visual separation - 8:08 - Tower asks PAT-25 if they have the CRJ in sight. PAT-25 again reports traffic in sight and again requests visual separation - 8:23 - Crash occurs

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]
jakeogh 2y ago
aaand.. it's gone. archive of the radar replay: https://dpaste.com/3DUG9YWFB https://dpaste.com/3DUG9YWFB sha3-256: 539b49e57443109cb0aea06209ce142d44a5ccbee16e42e0c71026742fc56703
- smcin 2y ago
  No, the Twitter/X post is gone but the archives.broadcastify.com link is still good.
jakeogh 2y ago
more: https://dpaste.com/HDBW79JMX https://dpaste.com/HDBW79JMX (no height data, so I ignore the overlay comments on the first video) sha3-256's 7c608babe5552ac436499978b1a458b3a74ddc7e1d7e5011c6573b724729149e 24a3e23aa97f348ebd8740af83b3b50ae7dd5cd5147e88636b564e93d99d9775 blancolirio: Potomac Mid Air Collision DCA 1/29/25 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouDAnO8eMf8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ouDAnO8eMf8

jauntywundrkind 2y ago

Anecdotally, the amount of helicopter & air traffic going on around DC has been absurd this month. My house in DC has calmed down some but we had a bunch of low flying fighters jets & helicopters for a bit. It's been wild having the house shaken at noon or 1:00 from pairs of fighter jets! I've had an in-week around Tysons this week, and it's been wild seeing pair after pair after pair of helicopter flying east towards the city this week. I'm normally up there once or twice a week and usually there's nothing like this.

zzleeper 2y ago
Agreed. Why so many heli's to McClean? Are they just too stingy to pay the I66 toll in the afternoon?

xunil2ycom 2y ago

[flagged]

foogazi 2y ago
Went on Reddit and them came here
drekipus 2y ago
always was

gonzo41 2y ago

I know that everyone crosses all altitudes during landing. But why don't ATC / FAA stratify aircraft type and use by altitude. Like all commercial traffic is put in even thousands altitudes. And the Military / EMS gets the odd thousands. Its crazy to have things colliding like this.

mbreese 2y ago
Everything eventually needs to land, so when you’re talking about an area around an airport, at low altitudes, that’s going to be a difficult thing to do. If you mix in helicopter traffic that needs to run at lower altitudes anyway, that is also near an airport, it becomes a much more difficult scenario to control.
dboreham 2y ago
Helicopter flies at 200ft. Planes landing have to traverse through 200ft. Therefore vertical separation impossible.
- chinathrow 2y ago
  This heli route is just crazy.
  - dboreham 2y ago
    Agreed. Seems that underlying all of this is "people doing inadvisable things because they can".
  - chinathrow 2y ago
    Update: Found the routes in the FAA HELDC PDF https://aeronav.faa.gov/visual/12-26-2024/PDFs/Balt-Wash_Heli.pdf https://aeronav.faa.gov/visual/12-26-2024/PDFs/Balt-Wash_Hel...
alsodumb 2y ago
Route 4 (the helicopter route along the river) has a maximum altitude of 200 feet for helicopter. From the crash it seemed like the helicopter pilot wasn't strictly following the ceiling.

mmaunder 2y ago

This will be the worst disaster since Colgan in 2009 which is the crash that upped the hours requirement for ATP pilots from 250 to 1500 even though both pilots had over 1500 hours. I think this is going to be a very big deal and very quickly become a political football. Regardless, this is absolutely awful and extremely unfortunate.

teractiveodular 2y ago
Early indications are that the airliner and ATC were operating as planned, and the immediate cause of the crash was the military helicopter.
lovecg 2y ago
This is an often repeated misconception. ATP always needed 1500 hours. What wasn’t required is for both pilots to have an ATP, just the captain - the flight officer only needed a commercial certificate. Airlines would hire with lower hours and train on the job. While both pilots in the crash did have over 1500 hours, the flight officer did not in fact hold an ATP. The rule also changed some of the ATP training requirements, and there were other regulation changes on duty cycles, etc. It’s very possible we’ve had a run of good luck since 2009. It’s also possible some of the rule changes helped. I wouldn’t dismiss that possibility too quickly. https://www.faa.gov/documentlibrary/media/notice/n_8900.225.pdf https://www.faa.gov/documentlibrary/media/notice/n_8900.225....

third_rate_econ 2y ago

Could be a relevant DEFCON talk: https://youtu.be/KYuBf2HpXJg?si=srOl5T6CY6Lg8HZQ https://youtu.be/KYuBf2HpXJg?si=srOl5T6CY6Lg8HZQ Sounds like maybe the ADSB was on in this case though.

blondie9x 2y ago

[flagged]

greenavocado 2y ago
Trump is fully responsible for plane crashes /s

theGnuMe 2y ago

Maybe the military shouldn’t fly training flights there. Just an idea.

warner25 2y ago
It's a bad idea. That unit's [1] task is to provide transportation to senior government officials and security forces around the capital, including to and from that airport. If they didn't train to operate there, then their first time doing so would be with someone like the Secretary of Defense onboard or during some other mission that's critical to national security. "Training" here also doesn't imply some 21 year-old flight school student learning to fly. The aviators assigned to that unit are typically more senior people who've already done a tour or two with more conventional units. I've lost count of how many times I've heard your sentiment already today, and I'm distraught by the general public's apparent lack of understanding about how things work. [1] https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/ https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/
- theGnuMe 2y ago
  I am appalled with your opinion. If the system can’t be safely designed with a safe margin of error then it is too dangerous. There are alternative ways and locations to train. If there’s a nat sec issue have the planes hold.
  - warner25 2y ago
    The missions are flown through that airspace multiple times per day, and it's all for national security purposes. You can't put a hold on all commercial air traffic every time, and you need to train the pilots to navigate and communicate through that particular airspace. Whether the system (i.e. separating rotary-wing and fixed-wing traffic there) can be more safely designed is a question for the FAA. The military aircraft are simply abiding by FAA rules for that airspace. Many more civilian helicopters are doing the same thing.

dmtroyer 2y ago

Are pilots landing at DCA conditioned to ignore TCAS warnings on approach? Would there have been one?

GaryNumanVevo 2y ago
TCAS has a minimum altitude of 700ft AFAIK
- inoffensivename 2y ago
  It's 900ft AGL and below while descending (CRJ pilot here)

teractiveodular 2y ago

To put this in perspective, this is the first fatal crash of a US commercial airliner in 16 years (Colgan Air Flight 3407 on February 12, 2009) and the first fatal commercial airliner crash in the United States in 12 years (since Asiana Airlines Flight 214 on July 6, 2013). We like to throw shade at Boeing, the FAA etc, but this is still an incredible accomplishment, especially given the explosive growth of traffic over those years. Back in the 1970s and 1980s, there were far fewer flights but multiple crashes every year was the norm.

cameldrv 2y ago
That was my thought exactly when I heard of this. I trust that like other major accidents, that we will learn from this and make the skies safer. Sixteen years without a major airline crash was an incredible accomplishment. It's a tragedy it couldn't have gone on longer.
OtherShrezzing 2y ago
I think Boeing specifically attracts criticism due to all the fatalities outside of the US in that time period.
- gota 2y ago
  And the perceived sentiment that those fatalities are directly linked to changes in the corporate culture that emphasized 'greed' and 'middle management power structures' over 'engineering focus' Not saying these are true - or false - just that the prevalent media coverage and social media commentary (including here on HN) has been touching on these points frequently. The 'good guys' at Boeing were pushed out or silenced, the 'sleazy guys' won and didn't care about the consequences as long as they got their payday
junaru 2y ago
Why is this being framed as airliners fault to begin with. When a fishingboat gets rammed by an cruise ship it's not "cruise ship collides with fishingboat", its the reverse. One is a big civilian aircraft thats being tracked and has no way of making sharp course adjustments the other is a 'VIP' with potentially ADS-B off. Heads should fly at whatever military branch the hellicopter was operated at... but they wont.

user_7832 2y ago

It’s probably really early to ask, but in case anyone here is knowledgeable and has any idea: why didn’t TCAS help avoid the accident? Isn’t it designed for such situations where 2 aircrafts collide? Do military crafts not have it or something?

kristjansson 2y ago
Too low, most likely.
whataguy 2y ago
It’s likely both the helicopter and the jet received a TCAS warning. In dense airspaces, those alerts tend to trigger frequently, so there’s a strong chance they may have dismissed it. The CRJ crew might have been aware of the Blackhawk’s presence, but if the other crew had visual contact with the approaching traffic (the CRJ), they might not have felt the need to take further action.
- m2fkxy 2y ago
  TCAS RAs are inhibited at low altitude.
  - dboreham 2y ago
    I've seen this comment widely. But...why doesn't TCAS show the pilots at least as much information as I would have seen on my phone if I'd been browsing flightradar at the time? It's one thing to design a system with "don't saturate the operator with audible alerts" but another to say that it's appropriate to withhold very valuable information from the operator ("there are loads of planes in the general vicinity, but yeah look at that one coming at you from the left").
    - m2fkxy 2y ago
      the TCAS data would have been displayed. but not on instruments or in any place that you typically pay attention to the most during final visual approach (ie., mostly outside).

windowshopping 2y ago

The real question, I feel, is whether the current U.S. government as it exists in 2025 is still capable of continuing to improve things, and whether it's still putting all the lessons of the past into practice - or whether we were just coasting on a combination of luck and the vestigial safety left to us by the diligence of the past.

LeoPanthera 2y ago
[flagged]
- insane_dreamer 2y ago
  nothing new there
tmountain 2y ago
The current administration wants to burn it all down and doesn’t carry any reverence or appreciation for past accomplishments or prior work.
venusenvy47 2y ago
Considering that the head of the FAA and TSA were forced to resign, and a hiring freeze on air traffic controllers is suddenly in effect, I don't think the current government wants to improve flight safety. https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2025-01-22/flurry-white-house-actions-reaching-aviation https://www.ainonline.com/aviation-news/air-transport/2025-0...
- contravariant 2y ago
  Honestly I'm expecting an executive order banning left wings at this rate.
- AdamN 2y ago
  Reagan fired the ATCs when they tried to assert their rights - can't be good if they think they may be the next in line for DOGEing.

RA_Fisher 2y ago

Another horrible cost of militarism.

modriano 2y ago

[flagged]

Dalewyn 2y ago
I'm going to head this off right now: This was between the pilots of the American Airlines flight and the Blackhawk, and the ATC at Reagan. Short of the controllers being literally understaffed, which I assume is not the case, the focus of this investigation should be what the sincere hell happened in the air there. This was a wholly preventable incident, hell this should have not happened period. Something likely very basic and fundamental failed catastrophically, and we need to figure out what and why. Bringing politics into this at this stage is unnecessary and deleterious noise unless findings implicating politics come to light.
- modriano 2y ago
  Yeah, it's just a mountain of coherent circumstantial evidence at this point. We can infer that liquidation of leadership and oversight in the agencies responsible for the safety of air travel might distract and strain remaining operational staff, but we don't know for a fact yet that that's the case. Maybe we'll find that all relevant pilots, air traffic controllers, maintenance people, etc were all completely insulated from and oblivious to the active public campaign to eliminate their roles including the emails they would have received on Tuesday from the US Govt Office of Personnel Management [0]. I really don't see a way to eliminate Trump's chaos as at least a partial cause, and it could only be ruled out if the investigators are cognizant of political context. [0] https://www.opm.gov/fork https://www.opm.gov/fork

rich_sasha 2y ago

Maybe not related at all, but I can't help but wonder if this is affected by the funding turmoil. Would a less distracted ATC controller prevent this?

fastball 2y ago
No.

snowwrestler 2y ago

DCA has two runways. The longer runway is aligned with the river’s north/south direction at that point, so planes flying the approach to this runway from the south track along the western shore of the river, leaving the eastern shore clear for other aircraft like helicopters. The vast majority of flights on approach from the south [1] use this longer runway. The secondary runway is set at a diagonal NW/SE. Planes flying an approach from the south follow the river at first, but then loop out over the eastern shore of the river to line up on that runway. To my eye the radar track of the downed flight follows this path. It’s possible since it was a small plane and only small planes can use the diagonal runway—it’s shorter. I mention this because this track takes planes into airspace that is a) usually clear of commercial airplane traffic, and b) directly over military facilities like Naval Research Lab and Joint Base Bolling, which have significant military helicopter travel. Basically, I wonder to what extent the helicopter pilot was surprised to find an airplane descending in that location. [1] When flights are approaching from the north, the main runway requires a pretty sharp right turn seconds before touching down. Approaches to the diagonal runway from the north take planes almost directly over the Pentagon.

Molitor5901 2y ago
The press conference this morning mentioned that this was a new flight path. I wonder if the helicopter crew were not fully briefed on the new path, if that is the case.
francisofascii 2y ago
In looking at the radar recording, the plane appears to be approaching from the south going north (very slightly east), than diverts northwest to land on the runway, as you describe.
GlenTheMachine 2y ago
I work at NRL, east of DCA and about 500 yards south of the crash. Can confirm that it is not unusual for flights to pass directly overhead of us, however I don’t understand the statement that this was a new flight path.
- 2y ago

vman81 2y ago

If anyone needs a palate cleanser after listening to a depressing ATC recording, I can recommend this heartwarming first time solo flying teenager dealing with her landing gear coming off after takeoff. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZ5q7Iv5wTM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kZ5q7Iv5wTM

dibujaron 2y ago
This was great, thanks!
Reubachi 2y ago
The amount of times i've wtched this video needing an excuse to feel hype is greater than 10. Her personal instructor finally arriving ("Maggie it's john") and Maggie starting to normalize the situation/making professonal raido calls really show the power of humanity working through struggle.
kirtakat 2y ago
Gods, her "OK" at 30seconds is fucking heart wrenching.
- Sohcahtoa82 2y ago
  The absolute terror she must have felt. All she could probably think of was that she was not going to survive that flight. Though it sounds like she successfully landed it without any injury.
deleted 2y ago
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coryfklein 2y ago
Thank you so much for sharing this. Probably the most wholesome, scary, heartening thing I've seen this year.
bolognafairy 2y ago
I’ve watched this countless times and I’ll watch it countless times more.

wnevets 2y ago

Whose idea was it to gut aviation safety?

outside1234 2y ago

The Boeing-ification of the federal government, in which everything is stripped down to below what is actually required to be safe, is in full effect.

nycdatasci 2y ago

AV Herald has a great summary and discussion: https://avherald.com/h?article=52374362&opt=0 https://avherald.com/h?article=52374362&opt=0

hammock 2y ago

I was a controller at DCA for 8 years and this is a normal operation with Helicopters using the Helicopter routes. The problem I see is the controller asked the Helicopter if they had the CRJ in sight, but he never said WHERE HE WAS OR WHAT HE WAS DOING! The controller should have told the Helicopter that the CRJ was circling to RWY 33. The helicopter said he had him in sight, but he really had the Jet in sight that was landing on RWY 1. Had the controller told him: Traffic ahead and to your left landing runway 33 is a CRJ report him in sight, then the helicopter crew would have LOOKED to their left and saw him. They unfortunately were looking straight ahead at a different plane. The controller is going to take a major blame for this one unfortunately for not being more detailed. Those Helicopters literally fly directly in the path of those RWY 33 arrivals so as a controller you have to be EXACT!!!! Another problem I see is the expectation bias. As controllers in that scenario, we want to hear the Helicopter say "traffic in sight and we will maintain Visual Separation. These Helicopter Pilots know we need to hear them say that (it's required), so they will say this just because even though they might not really have the aircraft in sight. They are just saying what we want to hear. If they don't, then we stop their forward progress or make them turn out. Comment from instagram

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deadbabe 2y ago
The controller will not take blame. It is a blameless culture where mistakes are expected and analyzed and learned from.
- hammock 2y ago
  Agree with this
- bayarearefugee 2y ago
  [flagged]
  - recursive 2y ago

GlenTheMachine 2y ago

I work at a Navy installation on the Potomac just south of DCA. As of 10 am EST today there was a moderate police and rescue presence on the water. There is a significant amount of debris visible floating in the river, and the boats are fishing it out piece by piece. The only things in the air are a handful of helicopters, presumably related to the search operation.

r00fus 2y ago

I wonder if this administration's firing of many FAA civil positions and the federal worker "buyouts" are responsible.

rapnie 2y ago
Just learned about it here: https://fallows.substack.com/p/it-had-been-16-years-since-a-fatal https://fallows.substack.com/p/it-had-been-16-years-since-a-... Likely more affected are learning about the aftermath via investigation, but I am not sure. Edit: No wait, that article mentioned the disbanding of Aviation Security Advisory Committee a week ago.
JadoJodo 2y ago
I'll bite. How are you thinking that might've contributed to the crash?
davidw 2y ago
The intelligent response would be "probably not, but we'll see what the investigation says". But imagine if the tables were turned politically. Fox News would be going off 24/7 about "DEI" or some such for weeks on end. That strategy seems to be successful, so I would expect the other side to start employing it more as well. Having a bunch of harried, overworked people stressed about their jobs and the future certainly doesn't help anything, in any case.
- TheGRS 2y ago
  Yea I had the same thought, its a ticky-tacky thing to say right now, but I wouldn't expect any more from the other side either.
  - davidw 2y ago
    And there it is. He's out there saying it right now.
    - TheGRS 2y ago

TheRealPomax 2y ago

"Commercial jet collides with helicopter during landing", while not the article title, would be far more accurate.

Yeul 2y ago

"Trump blames diversity rules under his predecessors, saying he believes people were hired for air traffic control roles who were not qualified - but offers no evidence for this" From the BBC. I swear to god they made 4chan president of America.

okvariation2323 2y ago
There is some evidence for this, unfortunately https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-a-quick-overview https://www.tracingwoodgrains.com/p/the-faas-hiring-scandal-...
- rexpop 2y ago
  Thank you for this. I'm still convinced that evidence of DEI is not evidence of its culpability. The real "affirmative action" is the coddling of white men from birth to job placement, while women and POC are deprived of equal opportunities. These assessment discrepancies are negligible. DEI is a red herring.

throw0101c 2y ago

"FAA Got Rid of Its Leader Before D.C. Plane Crash—Thanks to Elon Musk": * https://newrepublic.com/post/190942/faa-no-leader-dc-plane-crash-elon-musk https://newrepublic.com/post/190942/faa-no-leader-dc-plane-c... "FAA Administrator Quit on Jan. 20 After Elon Musk Told Him to Resign": * https://www.thedailybeast.com/faa-chief-michael-whitaker-quit-on-jan-20-after-elon-musk-told-him-to-resign/ https://www.thedailybeast.com/faa-chief-michael-whitaker-qui... "The FAA is facing a major crisis without a leader because Elon Musk pushed him out* * https://www.theverge.com/news/603113/faa-chief-musk-dc-plane-crash-crisis https://www.theverge.com/news/603113/faa-chief-musk-dc-plane...

dehrmann 2y ago
If we see more accidents a year from now, you have a point. The most you can really blame on leadership changes right now is stress from worrying about your next paycheck. Even then, this looks like a military pilot screwed up doing a routine training exercise.
- dboreham 2y ago
  Probably, but that pilot was it seems operating within a very risky environment (being able to see and avoid a plane in the dark in a place with many such planes and other lighted objects) that with hindsight should not have existed. I'd certainly never have flown on a plane into DCA if I had known that military helicopters were routinely buzzing around in the same airspace with no technological deconfliction aids.
- fundad 2y ago
  It's important to consider what the administration was focused on during a life-or-death crisis.
CivBase 2y ago
Gotta find a way to blame every tragedy on the politicians we don't like, huh? Trump is out there blaming Biden's administration for hiring bad ATC under the banner of DEI. Meanwhile, his detractors blame him and Musk for letting go of some FAA administrator. But of couse neither of those explanations are likely to hold water. The sad, mundane reality is these people probably lost their lives due to a miscommunication or misunderstanding between ATC and the helicopter pilots. And this political mudslinging will probably get in the way of us ever implementing process changes so it doesn't happen again.

JTbane 2y ago

Real talk, the helicopter was operating night VFR, right? How is this safe when the jet is moving extremely fast relative to the chopper and the only separation is a visual reference to some navigation lights?

alistairSH 2y ago
Right or wrong, the US has fewer (but not quite zero) limits on night-time VFR. This differs from some of the EU, where night VFR can have more stringent operating parameters than day-time VFR.
jahewson 2y ago
It’s not. That’s the simple answer. Accident waiting to happen.

gepardi 2y ago

Why is a Blackhawk helicopter Performing a “training flight” at night very close to DCA?

RandomBacon 2y ago
Presumably because they might have to fly a regular flight at night very close to DCA? Imagine if there was VIP onboard, especially if it was foreign VIP.
kube-system 2y ago
Because DCA is right beside a couple of military bases, the headquarters of the US military, and the political capital of the US. These helicopters are always going up and down the Potomac all the time.
alistairSH 2y ago
I'm pretty sure "training flight" in this context simply means they weren't actively carrying passengers. And it's not indicative of a junior or unqualified pilot (doesn't rule it out, just can't infer much from the phrase in this context). At the extreme, fighter pilots fly almost exclusively training flights because we're not actively waging war at the moment. There are a few military bases in the area - Belvior (Army), Quantico (USMC), Andrews (USAF), Pentagon, and some smaller ones (some of which have helipads, but no helicopters on station). And lots of shuttling of DoD and other government VIPs from location to location across the DC metro area.
- warner25 2y ago
  Yes, the public needs to understand this. That unit's [1] task is to provide transportation to senior government officials and security forces around the capital, including to and from that airport. If they didn't train to operate there, then their first time doing so would be with someone like the Secretary of Defense onboard or during some other mission that's critical to national security. And the aviators assigned to that unit are typically more senior people who've already done a tour or two with more conventional units. Source: I'm a career Army officer and former Black Hawk pilot. [1] https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/ https://jtfncr.mdw.army.mil/TAAB/

kranke155 2y ago

A real tragedy. Here on HN someone mentioned after a recent (last year) near miss that the US system was overloading the system and that some tragedy might be incoming. Maybe of the most insightful and heart breaking “competency crisis” related posts I’ve encountered.

kjellsbells 2y ago

Sad all round, and I hope that the NTSB, who are pretty good at getting to the bottom of things without getting into finger pointing, will do so. That said, DC airspace is complicated as hell. You've got very heavily restricted airspace over the city immediately east. VIP natsec/military base facilities on the other side of the Potomac. There are major highways to the north, west, and south of all the approaches. The standard route and safety corridor is along the Potomac river, which is heavily trafficked at all altitudes, with commercial, law enforcement, military, and VIP transport. The CIA is 5 miles up the river and is hardly gonna thank you for dropping out of the sky with no notice. Not an easy place to fly.

zombiwoof 2y ago

I'm sorry, doesn't matter who you support, but to blame DEI or former presidents for this is just shameful.

firdunupsa 2y ago
[flagged]
sirbutters 2y ago
And yet, completely unsurprising. I know there is no limit to how low this pathetic human being can go.
TrackerFF 2y ago
DEI is the new catch-all boogeyman. My take is that the emperor has no clothes, and most people around him are simply too afraid to say anything. The rest have something to gain from his current anti-DEI fixation. I fully expect Trump to blame every future scandal, accident, crisis, etc. on DEI.
sg47 2y ago
The Trump killings have started
stevenwoo 2y ago
They found a new scapegoat. They blame public employees, they just advised all air traffic controllers to find a job in the private sector after this crash. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/31/us/politics/federal-workers-opm.html https://www.nytimes.com/2025/01/31/us/politics/federal-worke...

andyjohnson0 2y ago

PPRUNE has a long thread about the accident at [1]. Usual mixture of perspectives, mostly well informed I think. [1] https://www.pprune.org/accidents-close-calls/663888-aa5342-down-dca-15.html https://www.pprune.org/accidents-close-calls/663888-aa5342-d...

Slava_Propanei 2y ago

[dead]

sega_sai 2y ago

For the record: January 20: FAA director fired January 21: Air Traffic Controller hiring freeze January 22: Aviation Safety Advisory Committee disbanded January 28: Buyout/retirement demand sent to existing employees