Weekend Update: Midair Collision Over the Potomac

A few new insights

On Thursday evening, just before 9:00 PM EST in Washington, D.C. a commuter airliner and a Blackhawk helicopter collided in a tragic accident that no one survived.

As a pilot of many years, I felt some comments were appropriated which I posted the next morning HERE.

I cautioned then, as I will now, about speculating with weeks of investigations underway that will provide the precise details leading to a fateful moment. However, since some have asked for more, here are my takeaways at as of Saturday.

• The clear night and bright lights presented challenges, especially at low level, for pilots to see and avoid other traffic. Ultimately, that was the responsibility of the pilots with the help of the controller in the tower.

• Tower staffing may be an issue, but a shortage of controllers is a national challenge and it doesn’t feel like a reduced number of controllers in the tower was a factor.

• The request to make a change in runways as the commercial flight was on final approach to one runway is something to examine. The commercial pilot could have refused, but it is fairly common for the smaller commercial aircraft to accept the shorter runway. The concern is that making such a change late creates an increased workload as the plane nears the ground maneuvering for landing and distracts the pilots from looking out for traffic.

• The instruction to the Blackhawk helicopter to be aware of landing traffic bears examination. The controller clearly saw aircraft converging. At that point, he correctly issued a warning. He could have told the helicopter the position of the airline traffic. He could also have told the helicopter to immediately make a turn away from the traffic and provided a specific heading. However, this would have seemed unnecessary with the helicopter pilot saying he had the aircraft in sight. Would either of these standard actions have prevented the collision? It’s not clear. One additional note: the immediate reply from the Blackhawk pilot that they had traffic in sight came with a request for “visual separation.” The tower instructing the helicopter pilot to pass behind the commercial plane is also a very important comment to understand. I do not believe the helicopter pilot was looking at the correct aircraft that night given that the accident occurred seconds after the warning. However, believing they were passing behind the commercial aircraft they were looking at and with approval for visual separation, an examination is required to determine if at that moment the helicopter pilot believed he could climb slightly as long as he was maintaining separation from the aircraft. Whatever the reason (and there are a few possibilities), the helicopter was too high by at least 100 feet based on multiple reports.

• Lastly, while staying current as a pilot with critical missions in and around our nation’s Capital is important, there certainly are times when there is little air traffic to contend with. Also, when there is helicopter traffic being cleared at low levels near the airport, the longer runway and instrument approach is far more favorable from my point of view; however, sticking to the longer approach will, at some times of operation, create delays at an airport operating beyond the designed capacity.

More will be learned in the weeks ahead. For now, we can only grieve the loss of life and look for ways to understand just what happened.