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

Twin and Turbine had a write up in November 2025 issue about her and her failings.

Again, Lobach was at the controls and flew into an airliner, killing everyone.
 

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FlightmechH3 said:
Twin and Turbine had a write up in November 2025 issue about her and her failings.

Again, Lobach was at the controls and flew into an airliner, killing everyone.
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That says she was in the right seat. The simulation at 20 seconds says that's the instructor position:


The right seat would seem to have the worst view. Who really sat there?
EDIT: I found it myself, the IP sat right seat. Twin and Turbine had it wrong.
 
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dtuuri said:
That says she was in the right seat. The simulation at 20 seconds says that's the instructor position:


The right seat would seem to have the worst view. Who really sat there?
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It was horrifyingly clear she wasn't scanning at all. In fact, the instructor had to take over one one of her landings that night because she was a soup sandwich. He was reluctant to correct her even when she flew the wrong way at another point.

He should have taken the controls early on and flew back to base. Then fail her.
 
FlightmechH3 said:
I am just pointing out that the Army should have never put a low-time pilot with dubious qualifications (retraining?) at that unit and especially flying in a night-time environment with NVG's. Her White House gig was apparently more important than her lesser collateral job of being a pilot and being in charge of a fuel farm. I had to run a fuel farm for a month as an E4 while the main guy took 30 days of leave. Yawn, it was simple and boring.

Are there an excess of Army pilots now they only get 4 hrs flight time every 60 days?
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Well she was a POL platoon leader at the time so 4 hrs in 60 days is par for the course. It’s not really the excess of aviators but the fact the flight schedule revolves around getting the line warrants / plt ldrs time. I used to fly staff guys getting their 1 flight every 60 days currency. Just too many duties outside the cockpit for them to stay proficient. Also, since they aren’t attached to a major division, they’re not doing much outside of flying VIPs. Not a duty station to build hours.
 
Barrett50 said:
I was prev excoriated for my rudeness pointing out a minimally qualified and low hour pilot was in that position. Noting I did not mention gender, or the social schedule which dominated her time in the DCA metro. It was assumed I was being a misogynist.
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Can confirm, merely and objectively questioning whether institutional policies *might* have been influenced by efforts that supercede putting the best qualified person in the pilot seat and therefore *might* have influenced a negative outcome will get you on the naughty list here.
 
Barrett50 said:
Final question on the army aviator: WRT her performance, would you want to go into combat with her on the stick? My spidey sense says,,, no.
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Not a simple yes or no answer. Depends on which version of me is flying with her. If I were a 200 hr PI (non PIC) and she’s been assigned PC (PIC) for the mission? Nope. But the odds of that passing the mission briefing process would be slim. Company commander and battalion commander aren’t going to approve that on either flying a VIP or a high risk air assault in combat.

Now, the 3,000 hr SP version of me before I retired? Yeah because I don’t need her other than to tune the radios and look out for traffic. If we’re doing a particularly challenging mode of flight (multi-ship air assault, pinnacles, brownout, etc) then she, or any other PI is not going to be wiggling sticks anyway. You’re always gonna have the most senior person on the controls. Even VIPs in Afghanistan we had a battalion letter stating the PC was the only one to be on the controls flying the JSAF CDR (Gen McChrystal).

This really has nothing to do with her being a woman. It has to do with the fact that the commissioned side just aren’t getting the exposure to remain proficient. It’s just the way the system is set up. The Army wants their RLOs in leadership roles and they want them well rounded (White House Aide). Every now and then you throw them on the schedule to maintain proficiency or if it’s combat, an easy “ash and trash” flight. This will sound crazy, but they’re not there to fly. They get the bare mins on the flight side in order to be a required crew member but their primary duty is to lead troops. A few work hard and become really outstanding aviators. In my experience, they usually go 160th…where they can fly as much as they want.
 
Velocity173 said:
Not a simple yes or no answer. Depends on which version of me is flying with her. If I were a 200 hr PI (non PIC) and she’s been assigned PC (PIC) for the mission? Nope. But the odds of that passing the mission briefing process would be slim. Company commander and battalion commander aren’t going to approve that on either flying a VIP or a high risk air assault in combat.

Now, the 3,000 hr SP version of me before I retired? Yeah because I don’t need her other than to tune the radios and look out for traffic. If we’re doing a particularly challenging mode of flight (multi-ship air assault, pinnacles, brownout, etc) then she, or any other PI is not going to be wiggling sticks anyway. You’re always gonna have the most senior person on the controls. Even VIPs in Afghanistan we had a battalion letter stating the PC was the only one to be on the controls flying the JSAF CDR (Gen McChrystal).

This really has nothing to do with her being a woman. It has to do with the fact that the commissioned side just aren’t getting the exposure to remain proficient. It’s just the way the system is set up. The Army wants their RLOs in leadership roles and they want them well rounded (White House Aide). Every now and then you throw them on the schedule to maintain proficiency or if it’s combat, an easy “ash and trash” flight. This will sound crazy, but they’re not there to fly. They get the bare mins on the flight side in order to be a required crew member but their primary duty is to lead troops. A few work hard and become really outstanding aviators. In my experience, they usually go 160th…where they can fly as much as they want.
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Thank you for the information. This just proves that the Army is fat on pilots. For a unit that is supposedly so important to evacuate VIP's in a national emergency, the commissioned officers are there to do paperwork and not fly or just barely fly, or escort people at the WH to the dinner table. When she screwed up a landing that night and the instructor took the controls to show her how to do it was very concerning. She declined to even try another landing. How is she going to evacuate a 2-star or senator in a crisis? Or even a taxi ride?

This situation is like the Prowler CFIT in eastern Washington in 2013 by a substandard pilot way out of her league, but was placed into that cockpit to get her "qualified" no matter what.
 
Velocity173 said:
Not a simple yes or no answer. Depends on which version of me is flying with her. If I were a 200 hr PI (non PIC) and she’s been assigned PC (PIC) for the mission? Nope. But the odds of that passing the mission briefing process would be slim. Company commander and battalion commander aren’t going to approve that on either flying a VIP or a high risk air assault in combat.

Now, the 3,000 hr SP version of me before I retired? Yeah because I don’t need her other than to tune the radios and look out for traffic. If we’re doing a particularly challenging mode of flight (multi-ship air assault, pinnacles, brownout, etc) then she, or any other PI is not going to be wiggling sticks anyway. You’re always gonna have the most senior person on the controls. Even VIPs in Afghanistan we had a battalion letter stating the PC was the only one to be on the controls flying the JSAF CDR (Gen McChrystal).

This really has nothing to do with her being a woman. It has to do with the fact that the commissioned side just aren’t getting the exposure to remain proficient. It’s just the way the system is set up. The Army wants their RLOs in leadership roles and they want them well rounded (White House Aide). Every now and then you throw them on the schedule to maintain proficiency or if it’s combat, an easy “ash and trash” flight. This will sound crazy, but they’re not there to fly. They get the bare mins on the flight side in order to be a required crew member but their primary duty is to lead troops. A few work hard and become really outstanding aviators. In my experience, they usually go 160th…where they can fly as much as they want.
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OK, I can grok all that. never having been in combat, I've been reliably informed that **** happens. So, there y'all are, first contact with the other side, and a lucky rifle round takes out your rudder, and puts a hole in your left foot. You have ordnance to deliver, ground pounders are relying on you, other ships in your strike are depending on you, and now - it's her plane.

See, I can make up scenarios too. And, I don't care about gender. It's not simple, it's complicated. And, I still don't want her sitting left seat. thankyouverymuch
 
Honestly, we're talking about systems that still have to use FLOPPY DISCS to administer upgrades. I think all options should be on the table.

VATSIM in the flight sim world uses digital strips and while the traffic volume is significantly lower, it seems to work. On the other hand, the Navy many, many years ago tried changing their "Quija Board" concept of flight deck control to a digital form and it failed miserably. To this day, Aviation Boatswain's Mate Handlers use nuts, bolts and similar accoutrements to monitor flight deck situation.
 
KE5BM said:
Honestly, we're talking about systems that still have to use FLOPPY DISCS to administer upgrades. I think all options should be on the table.

VATSIM in the flight sim world uses digital strips and while the traffic volume is significantly lower, it seems to work. On the other hand, the Navy many, many years ago tried changing their "Quija Board" concept of flight deck control to a digital form and it failed miserably. To this day, Aviation Boatswain's Mate Handlers use nuts, bolts and similar accoutrements to monitor flight deck situation.
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Digital strips aren’t always a better solution than paper though. Some cases (ARTCC) they work well but in the tower environment, you’ll hear conflicting arguments from controllers. Friend of mine went to Logan and they experimented with digital but went back to paper. If DCA gets any benefit with digital, it’ll be minor. Like ADS-B out in this situation. It wouldn’t have changed the outcome.
 
I'm not suggesting that it would. However, it's no secret that the NAS and the ATC systems need MAJOR upgrades. I'm glad to see Secretary Duffy taking action on it. I suspect that as in all things, the OGs of the industry will be resistant to change or unable to adapt whereas the next generation will have no problem. I see this in myself at my work daily. That's why my retirement orders are on the board. :happydance:
 
Low Level Flyer said:
Some of the commissioned officers early in their career see their future flying a desk rather than an aircraft and revert to warrant too.
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Yep. Seen a lot of the opposite as well though. Some have no intention in staying warrant for long and go the commissioned route. I remember doing a formation run in WOCS and asking a classmate what he wanted to fly. He could care less and said he was going commissioned at the first opportunity. “I just wanna lead soldiers.” Meh, good for him but that life wasn’t for me.
 
I am one of the few post Vietnam Army Commissioned Aviators with Master Wings…I had a weird career and reverted to W2 as an RA Captain and then perverted to Captain again after five years…the joke is the Army found out my parents were married. I spent my first 20 years all in Aviation units and even declined promotion once to LTC to do so and deploy as the XO. Senior Wings are even rare for most commissioned Army Aviators. What I did was not the smart career path but worked for me. Never happen today.
 
Don't blame old technology for this crash. Pilot's job is "see and avoid". 14 CFR 91.113 requires pilots to maintain vigilance to spot and avoid other aircraft when weather permits. This was VFR conditions.
 
This accident was more like Challenger than anything I've read about in aviation. In both cases not only was it was preventable, it's that the system that was setup made both inevitable. The only thing missing from this is a public hearing and a demonstration. Instead of holding up an 0-ring and snapping it, all someone had to do was hold up a diagram of the two flight paths, shaded to show shaded tubes of where they're flown 90% of the time, and that they intersect each other. Just like any other form of figure 8 racing, or a car going through a red light at 50 mph on a road where a car only goes by the other way every few minutes, most of the time it works. But eventually there's going to be a big noise. I think most people get that, the NTSB seemed to get that, but it's spooky to me that some actual pilots don't.

I think it's fine that FAA got called out for it, because it was their responsibility to make sure flawed approaches don't happen. That they don't have enough budget to do that is more, not less, reason to call it out. The rules are usually good, but when there are rules that are dangerous we have a responsibility, collectively, to point that out. That we seem to have pilots on here that are arguing that intersecting flight paths are OK if the pilots are really good is baffling to me. That's my biggest take away, that there really is a belief that great skill can overcome poor planning or a high risk environment. It explains to me some accidents where an experienced pilot ignored basic safety issues and decided to press on anyway.
 
Albany Tom said:
This accident was more like Challenger than anything I've read about in aviation. In both cases not only was it was preventable, it's that the system that was setup made both inevitable. The only thing missing from this is a public hearing and a demonstration.
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That dramatic moment was quintessential Feynman.

IceDunk.jpg
 
Sorry people, just seen this site... I wanted to make a few comments to everyone on this thread to maybe give some insight.

I have been trying to explain this since the first day of the crash. If the Black Hawk has the external fuel tanks in the best situation, you will have at least a 50-foot difference in what is real and what the barometric altimeter reads. Yet, this can be and should have been corrected for by the pilot and co-pilot. Yet, was it? The 12th's primary mission is to provide executive transport, aeromedical evacuation, and operational aviation support to senior government officials, including the President, Vice President, Secretary of Defense, and other senior military leaders. I became a helicopter pilot at 16. After college, I joined the Army as a pilot. I flew Black Hawks for 22 years in the Army and have 4200 hours of flight time in them. Before joining the 160th, I was in the 12th. I was in the 12th from 1987 to 1996. I believe it was 88 when Route 4 started to be the norm. The 12th is a unit whose primary duty is flying politicians in and out of Washington, D.C. Both foreign and domestic military brass and politicians. I would say Washington, D.C., and New York City have more helicopters in the air than any other place I have flown. DC is the only place I can think of where one of the helicopter routes crosses that close to a major international airport's runway approach. I have flown that route more than 200 times, and every time I did, I would ask the co-pilot how it looked out their window. (Remember co-pilot in a Black Hawk is in the left seat. PIC is in the right.) Yet, before joining the 160th, where night vision training is way more advanced, I would have never asked for a visual separation if I were flying with my NVG. That is because in a city with all the lights, and especially in DC or NYC, with all the other low-altitude traffic, without extensive night vision training, you are gambling with too many people's lives. This was caused by a deadly combination of complacency and expectation bias. As I said, I flew that Route well over 200 times, and as the report said, we would ask for visual separation every time. Any helicopter that was leaving Fort Belvoir-Davison Army Airfield and was flying to the Pentagon, or Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling helipads, had to fly Route 4, which put them flying across the approach/take off of runway 33. Countless private helicopters flew the same route to get to the Capitol Street Heliport, which is less than a mile from where the crash happened. I put the blame on this on the pilots of the Black Hawk, as well as the FAA. The pilots should never have been flying with night vision at the spot with visual separation; in other words, they should have left the tower in control of their approach and altitude when crossing through runway 33's path. I blame the FAA for not having the controllers in that location trained, being understaffed, and allowing this Helicopter Route to exist as long as it had to begin with. We said back when they first started that Route, there would be an accident if they did not change some things. I am only surprised it did not happen before now. It literally was gambling with too many factors every single day.
 
GLMS_NC said:
Don't blame old technology for this crash. Pilot's job is "see and avoid". 14 CFR 91.113 requires pilots to maintain vigilance to spot and avoid other aircraft when weather permits. This was VFR conditions.
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While that is true, "see and avoid" has a lot of limitations. In this case, I don't think the RJ had any chance of seeing the helicopter soon enough, especially at a busy time of flight at a busy airport with a helicopter that was down low amid a bunch of city lights. The helicopter had a much better chance of seeing the RJ, but having one pilot on NVGs and the other pilot being concerned with watching the first pilot did not help.
 
PAT flights have a defined purpose. While I understand continuation of govt as a justification, the reality of PAT is toting flag ranks around so they dont have to be bothered by traffic. Further, "PAT" as a flight prefix should only be used when a Priority member is aboard. This was not, in fact, a "PAT" flight. This was a training and eval flight as a PAT profile. Mission IDs used to be common like AE for air evac etc. I bring it up, because we cant look into the mind of the ATC guy on the scope, but leaves me wondering if he agreed to visual separation to avoid ****ing off a four star, or HR member, or some other VIP who can wreck careers with a phone call. Speculation? You bet. Viable? Possibly. 'What if' the controller knew, without question this was not a PAT, but a check flight. I didnt read the full narrative of the final report to know if this was mentioned.
 
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Barrett50 said:
PAT flights have a defined purpose. While I understand continuation of govt as a justification, the reality of PAT is toting flag ranks around so they dont have to be bothered by traffic. Further, "PAT" as a flight prefix should only be used when a Priority member is aboard. This was not, in fact, a "PAT" flight. This was a training and eval flight as a PAT profile. Mission IDs used to be common like AE for air evac etc. I bring it up, because we cant look into the mind of the ATC guy on the scope, but leaves me wondering if he agreed to visual separation to avoid ****ing off a four star, or HR member, or some other VIP who can wreck careers with a phone call. Speculation? You bet. Viable? Possibly. 'What if' the controller knew, without question this was not a PAT, but a check flight. I didnt read the full narrative of the final report to know if this was mentioned.
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While DCA might give priority to PAT through a LOA they aren’t automatically granted it. Despite the “P” in PAT, technically they don’t qualify for priority handling. Even SAM aircraft don’t get priority unless “SCOOT” is indicated in comms with ATC.

Military VIPs typically aren’t getting any priority from non military ATC. VIPs codes are entered in the remarks of the flight plan for base ops purposes. Example, “R5H” means “Army Major General accord honors.” That’s just to give a heads up for any special treatment from the receiving base / post. Doesn’t mean a thing to a controller though. Doubtful they’d even know what the code in the remarks means.
 
Velocity173 said:
While DCA might give priority to PAT through a LOA they aren’t automatically granted it. Despite the “P” in PAT, technically they don’t qualify for priority handling. Even SAM aircraft don’t get priority unless “SCOOT” is indicated in comms with ATC.

Military VIPs typically aren’t getting any priority from non military ATC. VIPs codes are entered in the remarks of the flight plan for base ops purposes. Example, “R5H” means “Army Major General accord honors.” That’s just to give a heads up for any special treatment from the receiving base / post. Doesn’t mean a thing to a controller though. Doubtful they’d even know what the code in the remarks means.
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Thanks for adding depth to my post. That's more detail for ATC. Only minor disagreement is that I feel confident that every ATC working the DC SFRA has a good understanding what PAT is. Notwithstanding any lack of 'official' priority handling for call sign PAT.
 
flyingcheesehead said:
While that is true, "see and avoid" has a lot of limitations. In this case, I don't think the RJ had any chance of seeing the helicopter soon enough, especially at a busy time of flight at a busy airport with a helicopter that was down low amid a bunch of city lights. The helicopter had a much better chance of seeing the RJ, but having one pilot on NVGs and the other pilot being concerned with watching the first pilot did not help.
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The instructor was the safety pilot. Period. When each of us acts as a safety pilot when we are with another pilot practicing approaches what's our main mission? Another set of eyes. See and avoid. Eaves should be looking outside, especially considering the traffic area they were in and the student has her view limited! He can evaluate Lobach at the same time. We all do that. Or did he think he was "that good" and had this?

This is not on the RJ. He did see at the last minute but too late. The PAT responded he had traffic in sight, he did not, was told to go behind, and he was not doing what he should have been doing. She already failed the checkride with her previous actions. NVG is no excuse and is no factor. We are safety pilots with another pilot under a view limiting device so exclude all that. The PIC made a couple mistakes and that is where responsibility lies.

It's a horrible accident and one that should never have happened. We can blame the routes, traffic, training, and all this other stuff, but had the PAT PIC properly identified and followed behind the RJ, they would still be flying these routes today. I am not saying these helicopter routes are a good thing and I'm glad they stopped, but when PIC's stop doing their job, civilian or military, a successful outcome is at great risk.
 
GLMS_NC said:
The instructor was the safety pilot. Period. When each of us acts as a safety pilot when we are with another pilot practicing approaches what's our main mission? Another set of eyes. See and avoid. Eaves should be looking outside, especially considering the traffic area they were in and the student has her view limited! He can evaluate Lobach at the same time. We all do that. Or did he think he was "that good" and had this?

This is not on the RJ. He did see at the last minute but too late. The PAT responded he had traffic in sight, he did not, was told to go behind, and he was not doing what he should have been doing. She already failed the checkride with her previous actions. NVG is no excuse and is no factor. We are safety pilots with another pilot under a view limiting device so exclude all that. The PIC made a couple mistakes and that is where responsibility lies.

It's a horrible accident and one that should never have happened. We can blame the routes, traffic, training, and all this other stuff, but had the PAT PIC properly identified and followed behind the RJ, they would still be flying these routes today. I am not saying these helicopter routes are a good thing and I'm glad they stopped, but when PIC's stop doing their job, civilian or military, a successful outcome is at great risk.
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NVGs aren’t treated like foggles in that one pilot acts as a safety pilot for the other by not wearing the view limiting device while the other is wearing the view limiting device. No, both pilots were indeed wearing NVGs that night.
 
GLMS_NC said:
You just made may point - the PIC should have been looking outside and not wearing them.
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Your previous post referenced being safety pilots for pilots wearing NVGs since they’re view limiting devices. My point was more about the fact that, unlike foggles, where it’d obviously be against CFRs if both pilots wore foggles, NVGs are different in that both pilots can and commonly do wear them. No legal need for a safety pilot.
 
Never took an Army military check ride with a just a safety pilot…the thought is just ridiculous to me…and I took more than a few…we sometimes flew Apaches mixed cockpit NVS/NVG but never aided/unaided just no reason to night hawk it…Crew members act as crewmembers…
 
Warlock said:
Never took an Army military check ride with a just a safety pilot…the thought is just ridiculous to me…and I took more than a few…we sometimes flew Apaches mixed cockpit NVS/NVG but never aided/unaided just no reason to night hawk it…Crew members act as crewmembers…
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Until someone says they have traffic in sight, when they don't, and you have a pilot with substandard skills and abilities, and no one is double checking her aka keeping an extra careful eye out. Result is ego's rein supreme and we have an accident where dozens die. Who needs safety pilots in these situations... we are the better pilots as we are military. Even the official reports agrees with me on this point.
 
Not sure where we’re going with safety pilots on this. Has nothing to do with a safety pilot. While scanning sectors are briefed for both pilots, the pilot on the controls should be focused outside for aircraft control. The pilot not on the controls, (IP) should be calling out traffic and obstacles. Not only did that not happen, as the IP and ultimately PC for the flight, he was responsible to ensure the overall safety of the flight…and that didn’t happen.

People still getting hung up on the NVGs like they’re foggles. You can see around them quite easily. You have too in order to see your instruments / lower panel avionics. Also, they’re not welded to the helmet. Just because they’re mounted, doesn’t mean they’re being used. Takes all of a second to flip them up. A 1,000 hr IP should know when to use the NVGs and when not to.

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Velocity173 said:
The pilot not on the controls, (IP) should be calling out traffic and obstacles. Not only did that not happen, as the IP and ultimately PC for the flight, he was responsible to ensure the overall safety of the flight…and that didn’t happen.

A 1,000 hr IP should know when to use the NVGs and when not to.
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What do safety pilots do? Just what you said above for the IP - calling out traffic and obstacles. Don't call them safety pilots; OK - role is exactly the same. You just confirmed it. Both copter pilots failed at see and avoid. a helicopter flew broadside into a commercial airliner in VFR conditions!

And yes, a 1,000 hour IP should know when to use what on any given training flight. 100% agree with you. Are these training and evaluation exercises handled the same way when the IP is of lower rank than the pilot being evaluated? Oh..... gets complicated now, doesn't it.

Everyone....PLEASE exercise good ADM. As PIC we ALL have a responsibility and leave any ego you may have on the ramp.
 
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