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Washington DC Plane Crash - PSA Airlines

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Lewisham2221

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A domestic American Airlines flight has collided with a helicopter and crashed into the Potomac River in Washington DC


Passenger jet and Army helicopter collide and crash in Washington DC​


An American Airlines flight carrying dozens of passengers has collided with a military helicopter as it approached Washington DC's Ronald Reagan National Airport.

The plane then crashed into the Potomac River, officials said, and boats and divers are searching the water for survivors.

The Bombardier CRJ700 regional jet - carrying 60 passengers and four crew members - collided with the helicopter as it was approaching the runway at around 21:00 EST (02:00 GMT) on Wednesday.

The plane was coming from Wichita, Kansas, according to the airline.

The crashed plane has split in half in the Potomac River with boats and divers now searching for people, US media reports say.

Follow live updates here

Three US army soldiers were onboard the Black Hawk military helicopter that collided with the jet, a defence official said.

The helicopter had taken off from Fort Belvoir in Virginia.

US President Donald Trump said he had been "fully briefed on the terrible accident".

"Thank you for the incredible work being done by our first responders. I am monitoring the situation and will provide more details as they arise," he said in a statement.

Takeoffs and landings have been halted at the airport as emergency personnel respond to the incident, the airport wrote in a post on X.

The Federal Aviation Administration said it was conducting an investigation.
 
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dosxuk

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Considering the number of near misses there have been in the US over the last couple of years, many of which are related to the quality of the air traffic control, it feels like this was an accident waiting to happen.
 

Spongthrush

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I'm not sure why you think the quality of ATC is questionable but the ATC system involves visual separation, thus human error is a possibility if there's a misidentification involved e.g. 'pass behind the xxx on n miles final for runway 33'. Use of visual separation at night has been debatable as it's more tricky to judge distance but also arguably easier to spot anti-collision and nav lights of aircraft.
 

dosxuk

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I'm not sure why you think the quality of ATC is questionable
Go have a look at the number of runway incursions, conflicting headings, unnoticed decisions and other incidents that have happened in the last couple of years in the US. It's more by luck that there hasn't been several major incidents.

There's an over reliance on visual procedures, lots of non standard phraseology and poor airspace management. Those aren't issues with individual controllers, they're issues with the overall system and standards in the US.

the ATC system involves visual separation, thus human error is a possibility if there's a misidentification involved
The entire point of ATC is to reduce the risk of human error. Reliance on visual separation at major, high traffic, airports is an anachronism in most of the world, yet standard in the US. There was recently a case where a German flight ended up diverting at San Francisco after they insisted that they needed to use an instrument approach at night, as per their company policies, with the controller basically refusing to slot them into his arrivals pattern because the instrument approach required increased spacing.
 

Simon11

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I can't believe that 18 hours later, they are getting ready to reopen the airport. Should they not wait for the initial search & rescue or first incite into what caused this?

How are the air controllers supposed to manage having had such a major disaster impact everyone.

I certainly, wouldn't want to fly into that airport at the moment!

USA- All they care about is the money......$$$

Meanwhile, it takes a few days/ weeks before we consider reopening anything in the UK after a major incident.
 

thejuggler

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I've heard a few news reports across different channels this morning and on many the report states "the aircraft collided with the helicopter"!

The aircraft had instructions to follow a set approach route for a runway and was on short final to land. I'm unsure how given that detail they were to expect a helicopter in their path and somehow avoid it.

It is far more likely the helicopter pilot was somewhere thah shouldn't have been rather than the other way around, as currently reported.
 

Bletchleyite

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I can't believe that 18 hours later, they are getting ready to reopen the airport. Should they not wait for the initial search & rescue or first incite into what caused this?

The cause is fairly obvious to be honest.

How are the air controllers supposed to manage having had such a major disaster impact everyone.

It won't be the same ones on shift.

I certainly, wouldn't want to fly into that airport at the moment!

Why not?

USA- All they care about is the money......$$$

Hardly.

Meanwhile, it takes a few days/ weeks before we consider reopening anything in the UK after a major incident.

An air accident that doesn't directly affect the runways at the airport? Doubt it.

I've heard a few news reports across different channels this morning and on many the report states "the aircraft collided with the helicopter"!

The aircraft had instructions to follow a set approach route for a runway and was on short final to land. I'm unsure how given that detail they were to expect a helicopter in their path and somehow avoid it.

Would such a helicopter be fitted with TCAS (Traffic Collision and Avoidance System)? If so that's how. Though it is the military aircraft's responsibility to avoid civilian traffic in the US if flying uncontrolled (which they are allowed to do there).

It is far more likely the helicopter pilot was somewhere thah shouldn't have been rather than the other way around, as currently reported.

From what I've been reading/listening to on this, US military aircraft can essentially go where they like, but avoiding civilian traffic is their responsibility.
 

jfollows

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I don’t believe TCAS works at low altitudes, perhaps not below 1,000 feet.

There’s not a lot of point of an automated system telling one of the aircraft to descend if it’s already almost at ground level.

I believe the helicopter was fitted, though.
 
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Watershed

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I can't believe that 18 hours later, they are getting ready to reopen the airport. Should they not wait for the initial search & rescue or first incite into what caused this?

How are the air controllers supposed to manage having had such a major disaster impact everyone.

I certainly, wouldn't want to fly into that airport at the moment!

USA- All they care about is the money......$$$

Meanwhile, it takes a few days/ weeks before we consider reopening anything in the UK after a major incident.
Why does the airport need to be shut just because of the accident? It's hasn't affected any of the infrastructure. It's just a question of waiting until sufficient emergency services are available again, so that they can safely resume operations.
 

Strathclyder

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Considering the number of near misses there have been in the US over the last couple of years, many of which are related to the quality of the air traffic control, it feels like this was an accident waiting to happen.
Air Canada 759 at San Francisco in July 2017 being the most serious of these near-misses (had it not been avoided, it could've become one of, if not the worst aviation accidents in history), but the most probable cause of that one was fatigue-induced pilot error and nothing to do with ATC.
 
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66701GBRF

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ATC recordings here
0:20
power 53 42 Onis Runway one 53 42 was 1
0:26
32
0:27
1725 Che Runway 33
0:31
yeah we can do 33 for Bo 342
0:36
342 33
0:38
[Applause]
0:40
33 Runway 33 Runway
0:45
33 789 1
0:49
32525 no delay Runway one
0:52
[Applause]
0:57
takeoff washing Town American 13 with
1:00
your Runway one American
1:03
3130
1:05
31314 2way 1
1:10
forart okay clear land Runway one
1:12
American
1:25
313 79 cont good day american3
1:30
fin
1:34
3130a
1:36
1
1:41
3 American
1:47
[Applause]
1:53
16337 keep roll November
1:55
[Applause]
2:00
American 161 324
2:03
2 33 no delay rway 1 take off number one
2:08
clear to takeoff American
2:14
1630
2:17
pass pass
2:27
pass American 4782 by that's enough for
2:30
indidual americ 47 onear
2:42
3 did you see
2:45
that3 left 3
2:49
300 350 3000 American
2:54
3130 Tower Blue Streak 5347 is on fin
2:57
I'll request uh Runway 33 Circle to
3:02
33
3:06
3130 main 3 270 The Heading 3000
3:14
3130 American 472
3:22
Cil American
3:25
472 one
3:27
continue weing
3:32
stre 5305 I you saw
3:37
that clarify what you want 47 to do are
3:40
we going around or are we
3:43
continuing American 472 is going around
3:46
we're going to climb maintain
3:49
3,000 Tower Blue Streak
3:51
5347 is on
3:56
Final all right for American 472 we're
3:58
on the go we're going to call maintain
4:00
3,000 you have a heading American 472
4:03
270 maintain
4:05
3000 Bic
4:08
11895 270 The Heading
4:11
3,895 American
4:18
4782 3130 uh contact approach on 1895
4:23
1895
4:27
3130 5347 is Primal request uh 33 Lu 347
4:33
go around clim maintain
4:37
3,00 go 300 Blue Streak
4:42
5347 America 313 contact approach stand
4:48
by crash crash crash this is alert three
4:51
crash crash crash this is alert
4:54
three crash crash crash alert three
5:05
where's theer 3 it is off the uh
5:08
approach the runway 33 approach Runway
5:10
33 helicopter
5:23
crash copy this
5:26
morning alert three two helicopters
5:31
helicop crj approach Runway
5:37
[Applause]
5:39
33 approach Runway 33 a mile
5:45
off crj
5:48
appro
5:50
okay have many TOS on
5:52
board we don't have any we don't have
5:54
any of that information
6:04
[Applause]
6:12
[Applause]
6:20
for to's reporting a crj helicop crash
6:30
car can we go ahead and hold hold all
6:32
operations till we have emergency units
6:34
respond we're going to go ahead and show
6:36
the air drone
6:41
closed yeah that's per for Operations
6:43
Air
6:44
[Applause]
6:49
closed Lu 5347 turn right heading zero
6:53
BL stre for 347 turn right heading 1 12
6:55
0 1 12 0 heading blue stre for 347
6:59
and everybody just um hold your
7:02
positions please on the field right
7:06
now 43 ready for tax everyone's going to
7:10
have to hold uh for now um I'll get back
7:13
to you this as soon as I
7:15
can uh fire command um the accident
7:19
happened in the river um both the
7:21
helicopter and the plane crashed in the
7:23
river it's uh east of uh the approach
7:27
end of Runway 33
7:31
is the Airfield closed yes the Airfield
7:34
is closed um the Airfield is closed
7:36
runways as well yes all runways are
7:38
closed nobody's Landing no one's moving
7:40
at all and we have clearance across all
7:43
taxiing rways correct yes you have
7:45
clearance through the whole field all
7:47
taxiways and runways
 
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thejuggler

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ATC asking if the helicopter has seen the CRJ was optimistic.

I know my aircraft, but I wouldn't be confident in being able to identify a model type in the pitch black whilst piloting a helicopter, close to an international airport where there were many other aircraft on approach.
 

Watershed

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I don’t believe TCAS works at low altitudes, perhaps below 1,000 feet.
Below 1,000 feet, Resolution Advisories (RAs) are disabled. These normally give pilots coordinated opposite climbing/descending instructions to avoid a collision.
 

Broucek

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I'm not an expert on aviation by any means but surely military helicopters are pretty maneuverable and its pilots should have seen the plane on rader or simply out the window?!

Or am I being naive?
 

Snow1964

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I'm not an expert on aviation by any means but surely military helicopters are pretty maneuverable and its pilots should have seen the plane on rader or simply out the window?!

Or am I being naive?
Air traffic Control advised the helicopter to watch for the CRJ (type of plane) and they acknowledged that.

There was another plane (American Airlines flight 3130 which I hear was an Airbus A319) cleared for same runway and following the smallish CRJ in to land It was nighttime and possibly the helicopter pilot looked at wrong plane (don't want to speculate further, but I assume identifying type of aircraft in the dark is not easy)
 
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jfollows

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I'm not an expert on aviation by any means but surely military helicopters are pretty maneuverable and its pilots should have seen the plane on rader or simply out the window?!

Or am I being naive?
They were doubtless looking the wrong way, perhaps down rather than up, perhaps with the manouevrable helicopter tilted to look down, but that’s just a guess on my part.
 

Ediswan

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They were doubtless looking the wrong way, perhaps down rather than up, perhaps with the manouevrable helicopter tilted to look down, but that’s just a guess on my part.
I blame Hollywood. Real helicopters don't work that way.

Crew looking in the wrong direction ? Plausible.
 

Edsmith

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I can't believe that 18 hours later, they are getting ready to reopen the airport. Should they not wait for the initial search & rescue or first incite into what caused this?

How are the air controllers supposed to manage having had such a major disaster impact everyone.

I certainly, wouldn't want to fly into that airport at the moment!

USA- All they care about is the money......$$$

Meanwhile, it takes a few days/ weeks before we consider reopening anything in the UK after a major incident.
What would be the point of keeping the airport closed? All most people care about is money the world over. It's a ridiculously busy airport and obviously they want to get it reopened as quickly as possible.
 

ainsworth74

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Let's try and keep the discussion of Trump's utterances to the main thread in General Discussion (here). If we could try and keep this thread to discussing what actually happened and related matters that would be appreciated :)
 

ainsworth74

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I'm not an expert on aviation by any means but surely military helicopters are pretty maneuverable and its pilots should have seen the plane on rader or simply out the window?!

Or am I being naive?
It was flying low and it was dark. Out of the window there are lots of planes in the airspace you're flying through and there's lot of buildings many of them illuminated. There's, frankly, just a lot of background clutter which can, in the dark, confuse the eye and lead you to mistake one aircraft or object for another.
 

edwin_m

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The lights of another aircraft appear static if the two are on a collision course, so even less likely to be picked out against a background with many other lights. And there were numerous other planes nearby so the helicopter pilots could have thought the controller was referring to one of those. I would assume they have some kind of radar, but the very fact they were maintaining visual separation perhaps meant they were looking out rather than towards the screen.
 

Cloud Strife

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but the very fact they were maintaining visual separation perhaps meant they were looking out rather than towards the screen.

The thing that I just cannot comprehend is that they were permitted to use visual separation at night while flying under planes on the flight path. It's so absolutely absurd and incomprehensible to my European brain, and I've read a lot of criticism of this from Americans.

As for how this happened, I think it's pretty clear that there were multiple failures here, not just one single point of failure. The biggest one appears to have been a lack of response to the helicopter flying at around double the approved height for operations in that area.
 

edwin_m

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The biggest one appears to have been a lack of response to the helicopter flying at around double the approved height for operations in that area.
That's an interesting point I haven't seen elsewhere. Presumably this would put them underneath the climb and glide paths of airliners to provide an extra slice of cheese, although there could still be a collision if someone was abnormally low on approach or struggling to gain height on takeoff.

I guess the ethos is to let the military do what they say they need to do, at their own risk, without asking too many questions. So the casualty rate for military aircrew is much higher than for civilian crew or passengers, but this is a very unusual case (for peacetime at least) where the antics of the military case mass civilian fatalities.
 

Tetchytyke

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this is a very unusual case (for peacetime at least) where the antics of the military case mass civilian fatalities.
Sadly with the US military it isn’t actually anywhere near as uncommon as it should be. The Cavalese cable car crash- and the cover up which followed- was just the worst example.

Without talking about Trump too much, I think his comments demonstrate which way things will go. TheyI’ll throw ATC under the bus because US military personnel are accountable to nobody.

Of course US ATC standards are particularly poor, a direct consequence of Reagan’s “reforms” in the 1980s. Ironic that the crash happened at the airport named after him.
 
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AlterEgo

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An accident waiting to happen. This one gave me the chills, as I’ve landed into DCA many times and sometimes seen the helicopters come rather uncomfortably close during approach. Always felt like an unnecessary risk. Much of the military flying around Washington is performative and was instituted after 9/11.

The standard of US ATC has been concerning for some time; ATC speak often in a sort of verbal shorthand which is not clear. Nonetheless, this appears to be a case of the military pilot misidentifying which aircraft they were supposed to fly behind, keeping an eye on it, and not seeing the closing CRJ.
 

whoosh

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An accident waiting to happen.

Turns out that was totally the case. There are now news reports stating a plane on the previous day performed a 'go around' as a helicopter was in its way as it was coming in to land.

[Daily Mail article with description of a plane having to go around on previous day]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...elicopter.html

[Aircraft tracking website showing path taken by flight in Daily Mail article on previous day, and that a go around had occurred before landing]

https://www.flightaware.com/live/fli...009Z/KBDL/KDCA
 
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Cloud Strife

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The standard of US ATC has been concerning for some time; ATC speak often in a sort of verbal shorthand which is not clear.

Indeed, a lot of European pilots comment about just how awful US ATC is. There are so many videos online of controllers at JFK behaving in a way that would see them instantly dismissed in Europe, and the quality of communications leaves a lot to be desired. It seems to go both ways as well, as American pilots also seem to be very much in the habit (in the US) of not carrying out readbacks properly.

That's an interesting point I haven't seen elsewhere. Presumably this would put them underneath the climb and glide paths of airliners to provide an extra slice of cheese, although there could still be a collision if someone was abnormally low on approach or struggling to gain height on takeoff.

Yes, it just seems so absolutely ridiculous and dangerous. The helicopter could easily have simply flown a (tight) orbit around the river until there was a break in arrivals, although this is a textbook case of why it's not a good idea to have military operations in such close proximity to a busy airport.
 

westv

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The standard of US ATC has been concerning for some time; ATC speak often in a sort of verbal shorthand which is not clear. Nonetheless, this appears to be a case of the military pilot misidentifying which aircraft they were supposed to fly behind, keeping an eye on it, and not seeing the closing CRJ.
I wondered why some of the released ATC audio made no sense to me without subtitles.
 
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