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Regional jet crashes into Potomac River near Reagan National Airport

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This is awful.

I just saw the video and the crash happened as the plane was coming in for the landing so these people were just minutes from safely landing.

A person who works in air traffic control said that the pilot of the Blackhawk was looking at the wrong plane and didn't even see the one coming in to land.

Just horrible.
 
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crimsonaudio said:
I hope they figure out what went wrong here. In fact I know they will - the NTSB is really good at deciphering all the data that leads to this sort of thing.

So much sadness and loss... :cry:
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I know there will be fault finding, but that is what an AAR is all about.

That said, I'm not a pilot, but if I'm flying a helicopter near Reagan, I would be really careful about the commercial flights into and out of Reagan. I mean, their flight routes into and out of Reagan are pretty predictable. If memory serves, they follow the river.
Plus, a helicopter is more flexible. It can ascend or descend pretty much on a dime.
Mrs. Tidewater read an article in which it stated that ATC had told the helicopter that an American flight was inbound and asking if the helicopter crew saw it.

There are a lot of lights, so I bet they were not flying with Night Observation Devices (too much light for NODs) but I suppose the helicopter crew lost the AA flight in the background city lights.

Sad and tragic all around.
 
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Tidewater said:
Mrs. Tidewater read an article in which it stated that ATC had told the helicopter that an Americn flight was inbound and asking if the helicopter crew saw it.
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I read an article earlier that said the heli pilot identified the incoming plane but was looking at the wrong aircraft. Not sure if that's fact or assumption - I'm quite certain we'll know more in the coming weeks/months.
 
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This is horrible! Unfortunately, this is not the first time a plane has crashed into the Potomac.

Looking back on the deadly Potomac River Crash of 1982

Having spent most of my adult life in the DC area, it was very common to see commercial and personal jets and prop planes coming in and out of Reagan National with various military and government helicopters sharing air space over the Potomac. That's a lot of ATC choreography.

:cry:
 
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One thing I noticed listening to the ATC conversation, the tower never alerted the PSA flight about the Blackhawk flying down the river. Such a heads-up may not be required, but could have made a difference.
 
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Elefantman said:
One thing I noticed listening to the ATC conversation, the tower never alerted the PSA flight about the Blackhawk flying down the river. Such a heads-up may not be required, but could have made a difference.
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I heard earlier that one radio frequency is for copters and another is for fixed wing? 🤷‍♂️
 
From the sounds of it, there was pilot error on the helicopter's side coupled with a failure of the tower to manage/inform the airplane of the helicopter approaching. With that said, planes can come in every 3-5 minutes at busy times to land and/or take off on a runway, so there's a constant incoming aircraft for a helicopter flying down the Potomac to deal with. This looks like a disaster in the making with the flight paths crossing on final approach for the plane. This is just a horrible catastrophe all around, especially for the kids/young adults with their lives cut so short.
 
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Bamaro said:
I heard earlier that one radio frequency is for copters and another is for fixed wing? 🤷‍♂️
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The tower will transmit on both civil and military frequency at the same time. But if the helicopter is transmitting on the military frequency, the PSA flight will only hear the tower's side on the conversation with the helicopter.
 
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