Posted on 01/31/2025 5:04:43 AM PST by george76
An air traffic controller was reportedly allowed to leave their post early just before American Airlines Flight 5342 collided in midair with a military helicopter over Washington DC.
Insiders and a preliminary internal FAA report have started to reveal catastrophic failures leading up to the aviation disaster
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That night, an air traffic controller was left to handle both helicopter traffic and manage planes - which should have been a divided duty
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Those tasks are usually handled between two people from 10am until 9:30pm
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A supervisor reportedly decided to combine those duties before the scheduled cutoff time however, and allowed one air traffic controller to leave work early.
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It has also emerged that the Army helicopter, which was carrying three soldiers, involved in the collision might have also deviated from its approved flight path.
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Approval had been given for the helicopter to fly no higher than 200 feet along the east side of the Potomac River, where it would have avoided the passenger jet.
The pilot of the helicopter confirmed sight of the American Airlines flight and was told to stick to their predetermined route and go behind the plane.
Sources said the pilot did not stick to the path however and was a half-mile off course as well as being at an altitude above 300 feet.
A senior Army official told The Times that the pilot of the Black Hawk had flown the route before and was well aware of the tight altitude restrictions and routes.
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Reagan National has been understaffed for many years, with just 19 fully certified controllers as of September 2023 - well below the target of 30 - according to the most recent Air Traffic Controller Workforce Plan submitted to Congress.
(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...
My big questions are why did the pilot go off course? Second, why were there lax rules in the control tower?
How long has this understaffing been going on? Why are we only hearing about it now?
Sean Duffy is going to be a busy guy, cleaning up all this rot
THEIR ??? Post!
Will we EVER get past this gender-neutral nonsense?
“All the catastrophic mistakes that led to DC plane crash as it is revealed air traffic controller left tower early”
To get ‘bottom surgery’?
Is the story about the TG pilot having real depression over his/her body issues true?
And did it cause this?
I haven’t seen something concrete enough to say yes or no.
Of couse, news gets out fast and we will know by the end of the day, I am guessing.
**My big questions are why did the pilot go off course? **
Kamikaze pilot for the left.
most likely they couldn’t find any DEI hires that even met their lowered standards.
It sounds like a combination of pilot (Helicopter) error and poor judgement over staffing of the air traffic controllers.
The helo had transponder off .
Collision warnings were deactivated .
Obama changed the way that air-traffic controllers are selected. .. abandoned the old system of hiring qualified air-traffic controllers who had a college degree in air-traffic control and/or were military veterans with aviation experience, because too many were white males..
citing the Wall St. Journal and the Chicago Tribune as proof, so liberals can’t credibly say that this is “fake news” or “misinformation.”
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/4293773/posts
Let’s play the Washington DC BLAME GAME!!!!
Since the DC inhabitants (permanent and temporary) live their entire lives blaming others for their mistakes, this episode of the BLAME GAME is going to be something to behold.
The staffing in the control tower did not play a role in this accident.
The narrative is President Trump fired the head of the faa and now the whole world is falling apart.
The army pilot screwed the pooch. Period.
And this falls directly into the lap of the chain of command.
Generals need to lose their command at a minimum.
Another flight aborted landing due to military helicopter traffic at Reagan National Airport just 24 hours before deadly DC collision..
Not only understaffed, but CONGRESS kept adding to the workload by authorizing more and more flights to and from Reagan Airport.
See: Congress Approved More Flights at Reagan Despite Warnings of Danger.
(that story is in the New York Times, of all places!)
So, combine insufficient staff with increased workload and what do you get?
Why did Congress keep authorizing more flights to/from Reagan? It does this for its own very selfish reasons -- those VERY IMPORTANT persons like the proximity of a major airport a few minutes away from downtown Washington, D.C. It's a huge time saver for them to not have to travel by car or limo to BWI or IAD.
Also why did the helo pilot fly above the 200ft limit around the airport, directly into the landing path of the jet on short final to the runway ?
ATC never should have let them deviate from assigned altitude. They should have been called on it.
Supposedly, this pilot is now being identified as a transgender, is the he/she a member of that same murder trans cult that allegedly killed the border patrol guy?
200 feet can be the error on the Mode C and ADSB. Static ports are in the wash of large helicopters. A poor quickstop can easly be done wrong and send a helo up 200 feet, ask my instructor how many times I sent us into orbit.
The design of the airspace is the root cause. The helocopter root for both the DOD and Coast Guard would block the airports construction today, long before noise and security concerns. Think Regan National needs to a changed to a military base and a military base needs to be made the congresses and DC staff airport with an efficent quick shutte train. Let them ride public transport. If we need to spend a billion to shuttle congress critters to hub airports to get home every week, now is the time. Make congress travel uncomfortable again, make it so the elders no longer want the job.
Guess same thing with helos
Gotta keep them at Anacostia to dart across the Potomac like air ubers for very impotant people at the Pentagon and Langley
Andrews just too far away
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