On Wednesday, one of the deadliest U.S. aviation crashes in years occurred near Washington DC’s Reagan National Airport.
As Townhall covered, a regional American Airlines jet collided with an Army Black Hawk helicopter mid-air as it was going in for landing at DCA. The jet was coming in from Wichita, Kansas with over 60 people onboard. Both the helicopter and the jet plunged into the Potomac River.
President Donald Trump stated on Thursday morning that there are no survivors.
The incident was captured on video.
HORROR: Webcam at the Kennedy Center catches explosion mid-air across the Potomac as D.C. helicopter and an inbound flight from Wichita, KS collide. Unknown number of people on board both aircraft. pic.twitter.com/yMnS28i7yX
— Breaking911 (@Breaking911) January 30, 2025
Another angle of the collision, appears to be from a CCTV pic.twitter.com/pj2CpbY4NM
— TJ Cooney 🚀 (@TJ_Cooney) January 30, 2025
Sixteen years ago, US Airways Flight 1549 made the news after Captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger ditched it in the Hudson River. This came after the plane struck a flock of geese after departing LaGuardia Airport and lost power in both engines. Sullenberger realized that they could not land the plane at any nearby airport in time with no engines and low altitude. All 155 people on board survived.
Over the years, Sullenberger has received a slew of accolades for his quick thinking that saved the lives of his passengers. The film “Sully” details his life and the incident where he landed the plane in the frigid Hudson.
In an interview on Wednesday, Sullenberger, who is now retired, spoke on the incident that occurred at Reagan National Airport.
“We’ve had to learn important lessons literally with blood too often, and we had finally gotten beyond that, to where we could learn from incidents, and not accidents,” Captain Sullenberger told the New York Times shortly after the accident happened.
Sullenberger said that Reagan Airport requires additional training due to its heavy traffic, restricted airspace, and short runways. It was constructed in the 1930s.
“It hasn’t changed much since then,” Sullenberger said. “Of course, we’ve added technology to it. But a lot of the technology is old.”
Wednesday’s plane crash occurred at night.
“Nighttime always makes things different about seeing other aircraft — basically all you can do is see the lights on them,” Sullenberger said. “You have to try to figure out: Are they above you or below you? Or how far away? Or which direction are they headed?"
“Everything is harder at night,” he said.
In another interview, this time, with ABC News, Sullenberger said that the aircrafts were able to see each other, based on the Air Traffic Control audio.
“At some point, separation was tragically lost,” he said. “Eventually, whatever can happen will happen unless we work very hard to prevent every incident from turning into an accident.”
Sullenberger added that Reagan Airport is a “legacy airport” built to “different standards.”
“It’s landlocked…there’s not much room for expansion…it’s considered a special airport that requires a bit more study to operate safely because of the short runways…proximity…traffic level…lots of different kinds of traffic that’s mixed together,” he said, as this incident involved a commercial jet and a military helicopter.