8 ms·

I still don’t understand the policy of the Army at the time to allow disabling of ADS-B Out in civilian airspace. I can understand in wartime.

gwbas1c 2y ago
> Doing so was Army protocol, meant to allow the pilots to practice secretly whisking away a senior government official in an emergency. 1: You don't want to do that for the first time in wartime. 2: In case you've been living under a rock, we are at war with Russia right now. We just haven't declared war.
- firesteelrain 2y ago
  True, train as you fight. But this was like a check-ride for the young Captain. ADS-B Out didn’t need to be off.
- lm28469 2y ago
  I fail to see how flying untracked in a public airspace 8000km away from Moscow has anything to do with the US being in a new cold war, I don't see what good it brings, especially if it's to play hide and seek around a civilian airport
  - Hnrobert42 2y ago
    The Russian Embassy is pretty close as is the Chinese. That said, they could easily track military helicopters with or without ADS-B Out.
    - firesteelrain 2y ago
      Easily? I suppose a surveillance radar on the roof of those embassies wouldn’t go unnoticed.
      - jamessinghal 2y ago
        American embassies do this worldwide, famously spying on Angela Merkel from the Berlin Embassy (probably). [1] [1] https://www.duncancampbell.org/content/embassy-spy-centre-network https://www.duncancampbell.org/content/embassy-spy-centre-ne...
        lm28469 2y ago
        And how exactly does it help Russia to know there are planes and helicopters flying in the US around an airport What's the next conspiracy? They have anti air weapons in embassies and wait for a military helicopter transporting a high value target? Either way it's not worth 64 lives...
        pc86 2y ago
        It should be pretty obvious to anyone who's spent more than about 45 seconds thinking about it that you can gather good information about a potential enemy by watching how they train. For military and intelligence operations you want layered security, and you don't want to make intelligence-gathering operations against you any easier than you need to. So it makes perfect sense at least up to the moment of this crash that if you're operating military training flights in an area with a lot of foreign assets that you'd disable a feature that literally broadcasts where you are with telemetry once per second. This mindset isn't conspiracy and framing it as such makes you sound like you have no idea what you're talking about. > They have anti air weapons in embassies? It'd honestly be pretty surprising if they didn't, but this is also why when countries officially go to war with each other the embassies are typically evacuated and/or evicted. > Either way it's not worth 64 lives Not a single person here or elsewhere is claiming otherwise.
        tonyarkles 2y ago
        > They have anti air weapons in embassies and wait for a military helicopter transporting a high value target? I agree with you that it seems relatively unlikely that there would be a large weapons cache inside an embassy. I want you to consider the opposite scenario of what you're dismissing though. If an American CIA officer in Russia wanted to shoot down a helicoper, do you think it would be that difficult for them to get ahold of a rocket launcher and do so?
- actionfromafar 2y ago
  At war with Russia, or at war with Ukraine? It's hard to tell these days.
- shadowgovt 2y ago
  If we haven't declared war we're not at War. Words mean things. Especially in this era when this administration seems to be gearing up for military action in domestic spaces when Congress has declared no war.
  - cafard 2y ago
    For how many years was the United States engaged in a declared war, and for how many other years did its military engage in substantial operations?
    - shadowgovt 2y ago
      I'm not excusing the malfeasance of past administrations when highlighting the malfeasance of this administration.
- HaZeust 2y ago
  >"We just haven't declared war." Then we're not at war. Hope this clears things up for you!
  - calfuris 2y ago
    By this standard, the US has not been at war since WWII. This is an absurd result, so I conclude that the standard is wrong. Official declarations of war have become decoupled from actually being at war.
howard941 2y ago
The idea is that you're supposed to train as you fight.
- firesteelrain 2y ago
  I get that but in DC airspace near Reagan?
  - howard941 2y ago
    Yes, you're right, lousy airspace design. Flown perfectly the chopper should have been no closer than 75' from the airplane if everyone is flying exactly on altitude (which never happens, you have to give at least +/-50'). Couple that with the difficulty of picking out an airplane against the hundreds of backlights of the valley and disaster was inevitable.
    - ultrarunner 2y ago
      The FAA says that I can't fly closer than 500 ft to a shed in the desert, but a Blackhawk is fine to be within 75 ft of a part 121 airliner in a bravo.
      - howard941 2y ago
        Yeah but the Blackhawk requested visual separation. It shouldn't have, it couldn't tell the difference between the CRJ and any number of lights around it. Anyway, at that point the request was granted and you see how it ended.
        ultrarunner 2y ago
        I recall the tower establishing that they could maintain visual separation, not a request being made from the helicopter. My point is that if everything had gone perfectly, as little as 75 ft of separation would be provided. This is unacceptable in this context for reasons should have been clear ahead of time, but very unfortunately are made clearer in hindsight.

gwbas1c 2y ago

> Doing so was Army protocol, meant to allow the pilots to practice secretly whisking away a senior government official in an emergency. 1: You don't want to do that for the first time in wartime. 2: In case you've been living under a rock, we are at war with Russia right now. We just haven't declared war.

firesteelrain 2y ago
True, train as you fight. But this was like a check-ride for the young Captain. ADS-B Out didn’t need to be off.
lm28469 2y ago
I fail to see how flying untracked in a public airspace 8000km away from Moscow has anything to do with the US being in a new cold war, I don't see what good it brings, especially if it's to play hide and seek around a civilian airport
- Hnrobert42 2y ago
  The Russian Embassy is pretty close as is the Chinese. That said, they could easily track military helicopters with or without ADS-B Out.
  - firesteelrain 2y ago
    Easily? I suppose a surveillance radar on the roof of those embassies wouldn’t go unnoticed.
    - jamessinghal 2y ago
      American embassies do this worldwide, famously spying on Angela Merkel from the Berlin Embassy (probably). [1] [1] https://www.duncancampbell.org/content/embassy-spy-centre-network https://www.duncancampbell.org/content/embassy-spy-centre-ne...
      - lm28469 2y ago
        And how exactly does it help Russia to know there are planes and helicopters flying in the US around an airport What's the next conspiracy? They have anti air weapons in embassies and wait for a military helicopter transporting a high value target? Either way it's not worth 64 lives...
        pc86 2y ago
        It should be pretty obvious to anyone who's spent more than about 45 seconds thinking about it that you can gather good information about a potential enemy by watching how they train. For military and intelligence operations you want layered security, and you don't want to make intelligence-gathering operations against you any easier than you need to. So it makes perfect sense at least up to the moment of this crash that if you're operating military training flights in an area with a lot of foreign assets that you'd disable a feature that literally broadcasts where you are with telemetry once per second. This mindset isn't conspiracy and framing it as such makes you sound like you have no idea what you're talking about. > They have anti air weapons in embassies? It'd honestly be pretty surprising if they didn't, but this is also why when countries officially go to war with each other the embassies are typically evacuated and/or evicted. > Either way it's not worth 64 lives Not a single person here or elsewhere is claiming otherwise.
        tonyarkles 2y ago
        > They have anti air weapons in embassies and wait for a military helicopter transporting a high value target? I agree with you that it seems relatively unlikely that there would be a large weapons cache inside an embassy. I want you to consider the opposite scenario of what you're dismissing though. If an American CIA officer in Russia wanted to shoot down a helicoper, do you think it would be that difficult for them to get ahold of a rocket launcher and do so?
actionfromafar 2y ago
At war with Russia, or at war with Ukraine? It's hard to tell these days.
shadowgovt 2y ago
If we haven't declared war we're not at War. Words mean things. Especially in this era when this administration seems to be gearing up for military action in domestic spaces when Congress has declared no war.
- cafard 2y ago
  For how many years was the United States engaged in a declared war, and for how many other years did its military engage in substantial operations?
  - shadowgovt 2y ago
    I'm not excusing the malfeasance of past administrations when highlighting the malfeasance of this administration.
HaZeust 2y ago
>"We just haven't declared war." Then we're not at war. Hope this clears things up for you!
- calfuris 2y ago
  By this standard, the US has not been at war since WWII. This is an absurd result, so I conclude that the standard is wrong. Official declarations of war have become decoupled from actually being at war.

howard941 2y ago

The idea is that you're supposed to train as you fight.

firesteelrain 2y ago
I get that but in DC airspace near Reagan?
- howard941 2y ago
  Yes, you're right, lousy airspace design. Flown perfectly the chopper should have been no closer than 75' from the airplane if everyone is flying exactly on altitude (which never happens, you have to give at least +/-50'). Couple that with the difficulty of picking out an airplane against the hundreds of backlights of the valley and disaster was inevitable.
  - ultrarunner 2y ago
    The FAA says that I can't fly closer than 500 ft to a shed in the desert, but a Blackhawk is fine to be within 75 ft of a part 121 airliner in a bravo.
    - howard941 2y ago
      Yeah but the Blackhawk requested visual separation. It shouldn't have, it couldn't tell the difference between the CRJ and any number of lights around it. Anyway, at that point the request was granted and you see how it ended.
      - ultrarunner 2y ago
        I recall the tower establishing that they could maintain visual separation, not a request being made from the helicopter. My point is that if everything had gone perfectly, as little as 75 ft of separation would be provided. This is unacceptable in this context for reasons should have been clear ahead of time, but very unfortunately are made clearer in hindsight.