yes, they’re on the clock too gotta be nearly freezing cold water
Definitely looked like a pretty significant impact/fireball at 400’ AGL at ~140mph or so. Seems not great for the possibility of survivors but fingers crossed.
CBS reports Sean Duffy is on the job at FAA HQ. Good luck, Real World: Boston guy.
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I’m betting this turns out to be an air traffic controller error.
comms are out, told heli to see the plane and fly behind it not into it
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3 people in heli, none senior officials
I used to fly the route the helicopter was on in the same type of helicopter all the time. I’ve also heard the ATC audio. Yes, the helicopter was 100% at fault.
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Bloke was called Arland Williams Jr. Quite a moving tribute in the wiki on him:
So the man in the water had his own natural powers. He could not make ice storms, or freeze the water until it froze the blood. But he could hand life over to a stranger, and that is a power of nature too. The man in the water pitted himself against an implacable, impersonal enemy; he fought it with charity; and he held it to a standoff. He was the best we can do.
— Rosenblatt, R., “The Man in the Water”, Time, January 25, 1982.
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Can this put put on the incompetent administration in charge of the military and FAA? Asking for a friend.
In Vegas for the last few days, you see all the helicopters flying around…saw a couple yesterday flying across the path where planes were taking off, and it made me think of this type of situation.
Based on the rules of right-of-way alone, the helicopter was at fault.
But yeah, now that I’ve heard the audio, it’s definite.
Flyertalk thread, which is often a good source of info: AA 5342 reportedly crashed on approach to DCA this evening - Page 2 - FlyerTalk Forums
Someone mentions that local news is reporting 4 people were rushed to local hospitals, so there may be a few survivors.
from cnn, A law enforcement source says there are confirmed fatalities and that rescuers have not yet pulled any survivors from the water.
that is bad, they don’t have much more time if any in that freezing water
18 bodies pulled none survived so far is reports
(where was the earlier 4 from, I haven’t seen a mainstream news report that)
Blunt force from the collision plus dropping a couple hundred feet into freezing water. Miracle if some people make it out of there.
indeed but it is possible, though probably not now, been too long in that water
heli less so, they can’t even get to it as it’s not stable
This one says 4 recoveries rushed to hospital, latest update was 9 minutes ago
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I should clarify the audio I’ve heard is the tower’s primary frequency which they use to talk to airplanes. The helicopters use a separate frequency. But anything tower says on either frequency is broadcast to both. I assume anyone who listens to the ATC recording will be hearing the same feed, so you’ll hear tower talking to airplanes and helicopters but you’ll only hear airplanes call back. It’s not that the helicopters aren’t responding, which I’ve heard from others discussing the recording, they’re just on a different frequency. The tower is hearing more than what’s recorded.
I can’t find the helicopter frequency recording in the archives. But based on what tower is telling the helicopter I can fill in the blanks. The helicopter would have requested visual separation when the tower first pointed out the airplane over Wilson Bridge, which the tower approved. This absolves the tower of separating the traffic by ATC standards and puts the responsibility to avoid a collision on the helicopter. This is ultimately the expectation when tower points anyone out to you in DC. If you just say you see the traffic, ATC will call back and instruct you to maintain visual separation from it, so a request from the pilot right off the bat is a common practice to reduce congestion on the frequency.
Although I imagine the helicopter was somewhere around Georgetown when they made this call, which is pretty far out from Wilson Bridge. You can for sure see landing lights over the bridge from there, but picking out the exact relevant airplane is tough, and if you think you can get it right every time you’re kidding yourself. ATC was likely giving an early warning of an upcoming conflict, not necessarily expecting the helicopter to accept visual separation just yet. Maybe half way down the Washington Channel ATC would have pointed out the traffic again and at that point the helicopter either accepts visual separation or they’re given a new route to fly.
And that’s what they did anyway. ATC didn’t have a specific responsibility to give further traffic advisories after the helicopter said they got it, but it sounds like they saw the helicopter was still flying on a collision course with the airplane and checked in again to make sure they could still see it. The helicopter must have responded saying they could, otherwise ATC doesn’t give the instruction to pass behind it. It’s possible they actually saw it but misjudged the flight path. That’s easy to do on a 90 degree collision path. It’s possible they saw someone else and it was an honest mistake.
Either way it’s on them. ATC did their part and more. I won’t be surprised if they catch some blame but it will be wrong. They’re underpaid, understaffed, and working with ancient technology. They’re easy targets.
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clovis, with all due respect, because i do respect you - there are only two plausible narratives here. Either the newly crowned hegseth defense is hopelessly incompetent, or the military decided someone needed to die on that plane. that’s the two narratives. we’ve seen this pattern before in other countries that has been documented well. again as always, hope im wrong - but cmon. air crash investigations are my autistic/asd side hobby and even i wont touch this. there have been so, so few air traffic control errors in us history, we’re kind of known for doing that one thing well.
it never fails for me to read a trump tweet about something and think yes the us president is talking like that
“why didn’t the helicopter move out of the way” “this should not have happened”
thanks for the insight 5 year old president
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