Crash at Reagan National Airport, DC. Helicopter crash into airliner.

Dear Lord. All the helicopters are doing is flying in a clockwise motion around DC ferrying VIP's. It's not a big secret in a national emergency
 
I think there can be a middle-ground between what was happening, and "I cAnT fLY maH piPER tHrOUGh YoUR reSTrUCTeD aReA yOuR STeeLiN MaH TAxEs sHuT tHEm MIlItuRY sOlDiErs dOWn GOBBLES"

Maybe some sensible procedures for peacetime non-national-emergency situations that would procedurally preclude this from happening? It wouldn't take much to be better than what it sounds like we had in place last January, in this respect.
 
Rick A said:
Who's to say it's only RJ type commercial aircraft using Reagan National that deserve military staff moving type helicopters removed from the busy airspace? What if swarms of unknown drones show up and begin blowing up things? I would think a military presence shuttling some rank around town would be appreciated to help make it stop....
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I will guarantee that there will be a tiny fraction of the current number of flights if you ground the commercial airlines.
 
Keep in mind the FAA drew up the route without doing their homework and the airliner also had a responsibility to see and avoid which they didn’t.

The rest is politics, even the position tha an airline’s crew doesn’t have the time/energy/desire to see and avoid in a busy visual environment.
 
Kenny Phillips said:
I will guarantee that there will be a tiny fraction of the current number of flights if you ground the commercial airlines.
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I don't disagree. The grounding or relocation of any current group of Washington airspace users to favor another group is not an answer, it's politics. Fifty plus years of sharing the airspace visually without a mid-air between these two groups of users should not be discounted.

The use of vision limiting NVG goggles and crew members focused inside (or elsewhere), plus in the Army's case sloppy instruction and flying, were the main causes, and they may be able to be reduced, but never eliminated.
 
I wouldn't use such strong language, but blaming the airliner crew is a bit too much.

They didn't ask for visual separation and lie about having the traffic in sight.
They were hit behind and below by a target that is (relatively) difficult to see, while being lit like a Christmas tree.

Let's not blame the victim here.
 
JScarry said:
That has to be the dumbest thing anyone on POA has ever said.
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No it isn't dumb, it's what is expected to make a system that relies upon seeing traffic that's pointed out and agreed upon properly work. The conditions that all contributed to this mid-air were, as they say, what can happen when all the "Swiss Cheese Holes Line Up". The flight crew of the RJ was focused on touching down on the runway, not scanning outside to locate very close Army traffic that (mistakenly) claimed that they had the RJ (with blinding landing lights) in sight. Period.
 
It was a mishap. Basically by definition LOTS went wrong. The RJ crew not seeing the helicopter was just one of them.

But that undeniably IS one of them.
 
If only there was a way to help aircraft avoid running into each other. Maybe a person in a tall building full of windows. They could even have a computer screen that shows the positions of the aircraft and makes sure they don't occupy the same space at the same time.

I don't think there was anything inherently wrong with low level helo ops in the area, or the airliners landing at the airport. They just should better coordinated. Permitting unrestricted VFR helo ops under only visual separation 200 feet off the ground across final to an active runway, even Stevie Wonder could see that problem.
 
Rick A said:
No it isn't dumb, it's what is expected to make a system that relies upon seeing traffic that's pointed out and agreed upon properly work. The conditions that all contributed to this mid-air were, as they say, what can happen when all the "Swiss Cheese Holes Line Up". The flight crew of the RJ was focused on touching down on the runway, not scanning outside to locate very close Army traffic that (mistakenly) claimed that they had the RJ (with blinding landing lights) in sight. Period.
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ATC never reported the traffic to the RJ, as they should have.
 
midwestpa24 said:
ATC never reported the traffic to the RJ, as they should have.
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That's right. Now I remember ATC talks to the Army on UHF (or a separate VHF frequency?). Another hole in the cheese. Plus, the blinking red warning light displaying for nearly 20 seconds on the tower's radar. The entire event was a Charlie Foxtrot...
 
bonefishpete said:
Wasn’t the RJ diverted to the short runway at the last moment. A runway that is just long enough for the RJ? Meaning the crew was concentrating on the landing more than usual?
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As was discussed way back in this thread, was not necessarily last moment or a surprise. RJs are frequently given the visual to Rwy 1, circle to 33 at DCA. Its almost expected and very commonplace at DCA. The only causality of the switch to 33 to this accident is that DCA tower also allowed the Blackhawk to cross short final at the same time the RJ was landing 33, with only the helo using visual separation.
 
Black Hawks are not easy to see at night. They just have a single strobe on the top of the tail, and another under the aft fuselage that are red for night ops, which flash slowly and are not that bright. They have one landing light under the nose that isn’t visible from above. I fly out of an airport with a bunch of them based there and I’ve had a lot of difficulty finding them at night when they are in the pattern. Perhaps they should add some extra lights to the DC area birds for their training missions.

IMG_0096.jpeg
 
Rick A said:
No it isn't dumb, it's what is expected to make a system that relies upon seeing traffic that's pointed out and agreed upon properly work. The conditions that all contributed to this mid-air were, as they say, what can happen when all the "Swiss Cheese Holes Line Up". The flight crew of the RJ was focused on touching down on the runway, not scanning outside to locate very close Army traffic that (mistakenly) claimed that they had the RJ (with blinding landing lights) in sight. Period.
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How was the RJ supposed to ‘see and avoid’ an aircraft that was behind them?
 
Lindberg said:
With appropriate vigilance, could the airliner have actually seen and avoided the helicopter?
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Yes, but it would be difficult and would be unlikely.

Rick A said:
mb, it's what is expected to make a system that relies upon seeing traffic that's pointed out
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PAT was never pointed out to the RJ crew and the RJ crew couldn't hear the helicopter's transmissions so the likelihood of them even being aware of them was relatively low. They would have had to deduce it from hearing only the controller's side of the instructions but wouldn't have heard the helicopter's position report to know where it was.

bonefishpete said:
Wasn’t the RJ diverted to the short runway at the last moment. A runway that is just long enough for the RJ? Meaning the crew was concentrating on the landing more than usual?
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Common practice that the crew would have expected as a possibility when they briefed the approach. The runway is short, but very doable, you just have to do everything right. The runway 33 approach, for which the PSA crews trained in the simulator, requires a high level of attention and precision. It would have gotten most of the crews attention.

midwestpa24 said:
The only causality of the switch to 33 to this accident is that DCA tower also allowed the Blackhawk to cross short final at the same time the RJ was landing 33
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Not really. The helicopter was only allowed to proceed with the requirement to maintain visual separation. If the helicopter had not reported the RJ in sight, requested visual separation, and accepted visual separation, it would have been held north of the runway 33 final.

JScarry said:
How was the RJ supposed to ‘see and avoid’ an aircraft that was behind them?
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It wasn't behind them. If it was, they wouldn't have collided.

The helicopter was initially in front of them, around 11o'clock and low. As they turned final, the helicopter would have been below moving to about 2o'clock and would have been blocked by the nose of the airplane for much of the turn. Finally, it was low and off the right side when both pilots would have been devoting more of their time to crosschecking the runway, descent path, and airspeed with little time left for scanning for traffic which they believed they would be separated from, if any existed, at that point.
 
TCABM said:
Keep in mind the FAA drew up the route without doing their homework and the airliner also had a responsibility to see and avoid which they didn’t.
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TCABM said:
So the PIC in VMC has no responsibility to see and avoid other aircraft? Can you cite that?
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While 91.113(b) does apply, they were in Class B airspace, and everything is supposed to be positively controlled in A and B. That's why you can fly VFR with 3 miles and clear of clouds in B.

Rick A said:
No it isn't dumb, it's what is expected to make a system that relies upon seeing traffic that's pointed out and agreed upon properly work. The conditions that all contributed to this mid-air were, as they say, what can happen when all the "Swiss Cheese Holes Line Up". The flight crew of the RJ was focused on touching down on the runway, not scanning outside to locate very close Army traffic that (mistakenly) claimed that they had the RJ (with blinding landing lights) in sight. Period.
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The RJ had no idea the helicopter was even there - The helicopter was on a different frequency, they were never called out as traffic to the RJ crew, the RJ was low enough that traffic alerts were inhibited, and the helicopter is poorly lit and would have been blending in with city lights... All while the RJ crew was cleared to land at a primary class B where all traffic is supposed to be under positive control, at a very critical time of the flight with other stuff going on.

I don't think it's realistic for an airline crew in that situation to be able to spot the helicopter, especially without any indication that it even existed in the area.
 
Problem: The Army needs to practice evacuating key people out of DC in an emergency while the politicos and public expect travel by airline be risk free.

Solution: Allow the Army to conduct the training between 0100 and 0500.
 
kkoran said:
Problem: The Army needs to practice evacuating key people out of DC in an emergency while the politicos and public expect travel by airline be risk free.

Solution: Allow the Army to conduct the training between 0100 and 0500.
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Better yet, put every rotary wing in the air and right over the homes at 200' AGL at that time.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
While 91.113(b) does apply, they were in Class B airspace, and everything is supposed to be positively controlled in A and B. That's why you can fly VFR with 3 miles and clear of clouds in B.
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Positive control does nothing to guarantee safety of flight in and of itself. Procedures have to be tolerant of worst case outcomes. It’s interesting the amount of faith aircrew places in controllers to assist keep them safe. As brutal as it sounds, aircrew, controllers, and the FAA as a whole have become complacent in mid air collision avoidance.

You want a quick fix, blame the helo crew and ignore an agency culture that doesn’t just not fully staff safety critical positions, but also does nothing for decades to solve that problem while continuing to increase the complexity of operations that rely on those positions to be enabled.

But in this particular mishap, it’s going to be real hard for me to have faith in the NTSB if their probable cause is anything other than the design of the H route. Whoever at the FAA penciled that thing up didn’t complete due diligence. Period. Full stop.

Everything else is a contributing factor and this mishap is chock full of significant contributing factors and. while I get Homemdy’s visceral reaction, it makes me question her objectivity and whether or not she’s got the right people focused on the right things in the Government and Industry Affairs division. This should have been no surprise to her and the after the fact attitude of “nobody consulted with us” is amateurish. She should have been ahead of this fight.

The failure of Congress to appropriate necessary funds for those positions is also contributing, as is DOD’s apparent obliviousness of the risks this particular mission set imposed.

It’s rare to see systemic failure; this mishap is a glaring example of systemic failure and the FAA is at the center of that system.
 
TCABM said:
Positive control does nothing to guarantee safety of flight in and of itself. Procedures have to be tolerant of worst case outcomes. It’s interesting the amount of faith aircrew places in controllers to assist keep them safe. As brutal as it sounds, aircrew, controllers, and the FAA as a whole have become complacent in mid air collision avoidance.

You want a quick fix, blame the helo crew and ignore an agency culture that doesn’t just not fully staff safety critical positions, but also does nothing for decades to solve that problem while continuing to increase the complexity of operations that rely on those positions to be enabled.

But in this particular mishap, it’s going to be real hard for me to have faith in the NTSB if their probable cause is anything other than the design of the H route. Whoever at the FAA penciled that thing up didn’t complete due diligence. Period. Full stop.

Everything else is a contributing factor and this mishap is chock full of significant contributing factors and. while I get Homemdy’s visceral reaction, it makes me question her objectivity and whether or not she’s got the right people focused on the right things in the Government and Industry Affairs division. This should have been no surprise to her and the after the fact attitude of “nobody consulted with us” is amateurish. She should have been ahead of this fight.

The failure of Congress to appropriate necessary funds for those positions is also contributing, as is DOD’s apparent obliviousness of the risks this particular mission set imposed.

It’s rare to see systemic failure; this mishap is a glaring example of systemic failure and the FAA is at the center of that system.
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It is on the Helo crew 100%, they could have asked for assistance and they did not , it is not like they would have been refused because there was nobody “manning the post” because of lack of money or anything like that - they themselves insisted they did not need any help and then ended up killing whole bunch of people.
 
I'm sure everyone understands that practicing a system to allow leadership to flee in the event of an emergency is more important than flight safety for airliners.

This isn't by any means a new concept. Dickens wrote about it about 160 years ago in "A Tale of Two Cities". There, it was a horse drawn carriage. Here, it's a Blackhawk helicopter.

Similar to a rout, individual fleeing action requires split second timing and practice. There are bound to be risks. One example in relatively recent history as during hurricane Katrina, where according to my Army vet friend, the Mayor was successfully able to escape the city without harming either himself, his leadership team, or anyone else. Something the folks in DC should be striving for. Or at least have a second helicopter flying chase that can toss coins out.

Probably should have colored the text with some sort of sarcasm thing, just in case...
 
Albany Tom said:
I'm sure everyone understands that practicing a system to allow leadership to flee in the event of an emergency is more important than flight safety for airliners.

This isn't by any means a new concept. Dickens wrote about it about 160 years ago in "A Tale of Two Cities". There, it was a horse drawn carriage. Here, it's a Blackhawk helicopter.

Similar to a rout, individual fleeing action requires split second timing and practice. There are bound to be risks. One example in relatively recent history as during hurricane Katrina, where according to my Army vet friend, the Mayor was successfully able to escape the city without harming either himself, his leadership team, or anyone else. Something the folks in DC should be striving for. Or at least have a second helicopter flying chase that can toss coins out.

Probably should have colored the text with some sort of sarcasm thing, just in case...
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Indeed. Perhaps I'm becoming jaded in my old age, but the idea a plan must be in place to evacuate "Leadership" (it must be capitalized ) is simply asinine. How many gold top helicopters are in that command? Besides the multitude of cabinet members, national security staff, and others in the executive branch, there are 535 representatives and 100 senators. Don't forget the Supreme Court members. There are thousands and thousands of Almost Important Persons too. Who gets to go first?

What, exactly, is the criteria for the mass bugout to be triggered? Let's be serious. An attack on the seat of government is going to be either a missile, drone, or aircraft. It'll happen within a few minutes. It's not going to kill more than a few hundred of these supposedly important people before defensive measures are enacted. I don't think they're that important anyway. The United States of America isn't going to collapse if a few of those big white buildings are targeted.

The entire concept of a plan to Remove Important and Irreplaceable Persons falls apart under the most basic level of scrutiny. It's ridiculous.
 
These operations have safely coexisted for many years, so the idea that they can't possibly safely coexist is wrong.

And while I'm certain you are very important to your friends and family, the notion that there aren't people who are actually significantly more important than you to the continued functioning of our elected government in times of crisis is utterly absurd.
 
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