A regional jet collided with a helicopter near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Virginia on Wednesday evening, according to DC Fire and EMS.
The aircraft went down in the Potomac River vicinity of the airport. Officials said fireboats were on the scene.
The Federal Aviation Administration said preliminary information indicates a PSA Airlines Bombardier CRJ700 regional jet collided in midair with a Sikorsky H-60 helicopter while on approach to the airport around 9 p.m. local time.
Seems it was a military helicopter (from your link):
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt commented on the crash Wednesday night. It appears that a military helicopter collided with a regional jet at DCA airport right here in Washington, D.C."
There is video of the incident. I won’t post it, nor comment on it, other than to say that it was disturbing and a bit puzzling as to how this could have happened. I did hear however that there were at least some survivors. Let’s hope they find more.
An unfortunate accident. There are many, many military and gov’t helicopters at all hours in that very congested airspace. I used to live on MacArthur blvd. adjacent to the river and they would fly very low up and down the river all day every day.
It looks like the AA flight was approaching to a lesser-used rwy-- there may have been some mixed messages.
My parents lived in Virginia when a plane went into a bridge on the Beltway back in the 80s. Between that and the approach into National my mother has refused to fly into that airport ever since. I’m not sure how many might have been able to survive this one but I’m sure going into the Potomac will have increased the death toll.
It would have been air florida flight 90, hit the 14th st. bridge, later renamed the Lenny Skutnik bridge for the guy that jumped in and rescued a lady.
Editing after checking, the 14th street bridge was renamed Arland D Williams bridge. He was the mysterious person that kept handing off the rescue rope from the helicopter to others, then ended up drowning.
ISTR that Mr. Skutnik, when he was pulled from the water, joked with a First Responder that jet fuel would never become a popular cocktail. I can’t find a link to this, but here’s a story that ran in the Washington Post a day or two later, and is not paywalled.
I’ve also read that an autopsy revealed that Arland Williams, had he been pulled from the water alive, would have been paralyzed for life and had other injuries that probably would have proven fatal. He probably knew, in the way that dying people often do.
I was about 12 at the time, and don’t remember many quotes except for Mike Buchannan on channel 9 talking about it, then the photo on the Post of the tail section being lifted out of the river. We had a snow day, came back from playing outside and was glued to the Tv for hours. It was very dramatic.
This evening’s tragedy is a reminder.
Howard Stern, then a local DJ in the DC area, pretended to call Air Florida the next day and ask what the fare was from National Airport to the 14th St. Bridge. I thought he had been fired over that bit, but he has claimed that no one complained.
There’s now at least two videos of the collision being shown intermittently on NewsNation, a cable news channel. You can see the lights of the plane headed toward the camera and a tiny lighted dot coming in fast on the plane’s right side; the two light sources merge and erupt into a fireball, then debris is visible falling – a large amount to the left and sharply down as you view the video and a smaller amount arcing downward to one’s right as if continuing the chopper’s path.
Just heard on CNN that bodies have been recovered but as of yet no survivors. Between the force of the collision and the frigid water of the river, I doubt anyone will have survived.
Do helicopters have those as well? (I do not know) I’d think it has to be different for a helicopter. What if they are hovering and get a TCAS warning vs two planes? I’d think the, “do this now” warning is a lot more complex on a helicopter (or can be) than it is for two planes.
Just heard on CNN that the plane is in several pieces in the Potomac. Heard on NewsNation, I believe, that the helicopter is also in the river and “bobbing”, making it difficult for recovery divers to search the wreckage for possible survivors.
Several different news channels covering it, mostly with visuals of lights along the river interspersed with replays of the collision, while commentators of various more or less relevant backgrounds commentate.
I daresay we won’t have a clearer picture of it all till sometime tomorrow at the very least.