January 31, 2025, 19:17:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818470
DCA has a powerful constituency of lawmakers who love it for its convenience. The helicopters have a powerful constituency of military leaders who love them for their convenience. Elites in our government have ignored clear and present safety issues to save some time.
Subjects
DCA
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January 31, 2025, 20:53:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818524
You need to go further back in the ATC playbacks. The helicopter crew had previously reported visual contact with the CRJ and requested (yes - requested) and been given responsibility for visual separation. The exchange you are referring to is the one which followed the collision alert and the controller's subsequent questioning of the helicopter crew as to whether they really did have the CRJ in sight.
Subjects
ATC
CRJ
DCA
Separation (ALL)
Visual Separation
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January 31, 2025, 21:10:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818537
This accident is beginning to look like the authorities/administration/systems/procedures (DoD/FAA/ATC) put these two perfectly airworthy modern aircraft with expensively trained professional aircrew into a scenario that ended up in an accident.
If that\x92s the case it was only a matter of time before this occurred.
From here on it will be interesting to see how the causality factors align. In less polite terms; who\x92s at fault\x85
If you are put in an impossible position by a system\x85. how can the system then expect an impossible recovery? Oh right; it\x92s the system.
Sad BD
If that\x92s the case it was only a matter of time before this occurred.
From here on it will be interesting to see how the causality factors align. In less polite terms; who\x92s at fault\x85
If you are put in an impossible position by a system\x85. how can the system then expect an impossible recovery? Oh right; it\x92s the system.
Sad BD
Subjects
ADSB (All)
ADSB Out
DCA
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February 01, 2025, 01:20:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818686
It’s not always been this way. This is a product of security mindset, post-9/11. There were rarely helicopters flying on the Potomac in the area of DCA before. Now, there’s a spotters webpage—all police, Army, CG, etc.
Subjects
DCA
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February 01, 2025, 03:09:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818724
I tend to think ATC and, likely, the FAA will be shown as primary at fault with this:
1. The CRJ was on approach to 1 and then was asked to divert to 33. They complied, which added to their workload. From what I understand, that runway is rarely used for commercial aircraft. So, ATC added to the CRJ's workload while introducing and "unusual event." The CRJ crew appears to have acted professionally in changing their approach.
2. ATC didn't hold the helo short of the runway path, instead relied on them to correctly identify an aircraft, at night, over an urban area. That introduced a "single point of failure" to an already complex situation.
3. There was no way for the helo to pass safely under the CRJ at the altitude of impact.
3. I don't recall hearing ATC asking the CRJ if they could see the helo, though they already overtasked them. At that point, I don't think they could do anything at that point to prevent the collision.
Other factors may come into play, such as if ATC was properly staffed that night. I've read that DCA had two incidents that week where an aircraft had to perform a "go around" because of helo traffic. Also, was the CRJ's TCAS system operational?
This was completely preventable if things work they way they're supposed to.
1. The CRJ was on approach to 1 and then was asked to divert to 33. They complied, which added to their workload. From what I understand, that runway is rarely used for commercial aircraft. So, ATC added to the CRJ's workload while introducing and "unusual event." The CRJ crew appears to have acted professionally in changing their approach.
2. ATC didn't hold the helo short of the runway path, instead relied on them to correctly identify an aircraft, at night, over an urban area. That introduced a "single point of failure" to an already complex situation.
3. There was no way for the helo to pass safely under the CRJ at the altitude of impact.
3. I don't recall hearing ATC asking the CRJ if they could see the helo, though they already overtasked them. At that point, I don't think they could do anything at that point to prevent the collision.
Other factors may come into play, such as if ATC was properly staffed that night. I've read that DCA had two incidents that week where an aircraft had to perform a "go around" because of helo traffic. Also, was the CRJ's TCAS system operational?
This was completely preventable if things work they way they're supposed to.
Subjects
ATC
CRJ
DCA
FAA
TCAS (All)
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February 01, 2025, 03:14:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818731
I shall remind you all again, as Pilot DAR has already reminded you all: keep the politics out of this.
If you can't post professionally on the aviation matters to hand, then don't post.
Whether or not the FAA has, or has not, fulfilled it's role is a functional, not political, matter if you can be bothered to constrain yourselves to the functional aspects of regulation.
You will not be warned again.
EDITED this post due to a link problem:
AA5342 Down DCA
Carry on.
If you can't post professionally on the aviation matters to hand, then don't post.
Whether or not the FAA has, or has not, fulfilled it's role is a functional, not political, matter if you can be bothered to constrain yourselves to the functional aspects of regulation.
You will not be warned again.
EDITED this post due to a link problem:
AA5342 Down DCA
The moderators have had a background discussion about this situation, and agreed to stand by the exclusion of political discussion as is the policy of PPRuNe. That said, this accident, and the investigation and introspection to come are going to run the ragged edge of political discussion. We want the aviation safety discussion, we don't want it lost in discussion and emotion about politics - we just don't have the page space! (and it's a lot of work to moderate!).
Posts referencing actual facts, reported from authoritative sources, and primarily on the topic of the accident, the investigation, and associated safety are welcomed here. If in doubt, just leave out the political part of what you're thinking to write, we all know that you have an opinion, we don't need to read it here. If your post touches to role of a government official as a factor of the event, without inflaming discussion, the moderation team will do it's best to find a favourable interpretation.
Thanks for working with the moderation team on this...
Pilot DAR
Posts referencing actual facts, reported from authoritative sources, and primarily on the topic of the accident, the investigation, and associated safety are welcomed here. If in doubt, just leave out the political part of what you're thinking to write, we all know that you have an opinion, we don't need to read it here. If your post touches to role of a government official as a factor of the event, without inflaming discussion, the moderation team will do it's best to find a favourable interpretation.
Thanks for working with the moderation team on this...
Pilot DAR
Last edited by T28B; 2nd February 2025 at 19:01 . Reason: link problem required an edit
Subjects
AA5342
DCA
FAA
Thread Moderation
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February 01, 2025, 03:34:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818738
1. The CRJ was on approach to 1 and then was asked to divert to 33. They complied, which added to their workload. From what I understand, that runway is rarely used for commercial aircraft. So, ATC added to the CRJ's workload while introducing and "unusual event." The CRJ crew appears to have acted professionally in changing their approach.
2. ATC didn't hold the helo short of the runway path, instead relied on them to correctly identify an aircraft, at night, over an urban area. That introduced a "single point of failure" to an already complex situation.
3. There was no way for the helo to pass safely under the CRJ at the altitude of impact.
3. I don't recall hearing ATC asking the CRJ if they could see the helo, though they already overtasked them. At that point, I don't think they could do anything at that point to prevent the collision.
Other factors may come into play, such as if ATC was properly staffed that night. I've read that DCA had two incidents that week where an aircraft had to perform a "go around" because of helo traffic. Also, was the CRJ's TCAS system operational?
This was completely preventable if things work they way they're supposed to.
Everything else is moot, really...
Subjects
ATC
CRJ
DCA
FAA
Separation (ALL)
TCAS (All)
Visual Separation
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February 01, 2025, 03:58:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818753
This endless discussion about UHF/VHF frequencies is a bit disturbing.
Please read the helicopter route chart.
https://aeronav.faa.gov/visual/09-05...-Wash_Heli.pdf
There is a DCA tower frequency dedicated to helicopters: "134.35 (HELI)".
And it looks VHF to me.
Edit: Sorry, didn't see that skwdenyer had already answered
Please read the helicopter route chart.
https://aeronav.faa.gov/visual/09-05...-Wash_Heli.pdf
There is a DCA tower frequency dedicated to helicopters: "134.35 (HELI)".
And it looks VHF to me.
Edit: Sorry, didn't see that skwdenyer had already answered
Ugh, for the umpteenth time, and put it to bed, helo frequency to DCA CT is 257.6. Take another look at the chart, please. Army helicopters in that area communicate with DCA on UHF.
FYI, the PP in PPRUNE stands for Professional Pilots, stick with playing X-Plane in moms basement.
Subjects
DCA
Frequency 134.35
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February 01, 2025, 05:28:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11818786
Where did they fly before? And is there more helicopter traffic now?
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DCA
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February 01, 2025, 14:26:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819059
Agree. Redesigning the Helicopter route or procedure now seems essential.
- but equally describing a fast developing potential collision situation in terms referencing local bridges (was the pilot local ?) is (at least with hindsight) inadequate and something 'far more alarming' could have been said in time.
- but equally describing a fast developing potential collision situation in terms referencing local bridges (was the pilot local ?) is (at least with hindsight) inadequate and something 'far more alarming' could have been said in time.
I have only once flown into the Washington area, and it was more than a decade ago in a light single. I seem to recall DCA required special training even for airline pilots.
Is that not the case now or not for helicopter pilots? I thought it was a case where you need to be familiar to use those routes.
Subjects
DCA
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February 01, 2025, 15:17:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819090
200 ft is not the separation between the 2 aircrafts, it's the maximum altitude allowed in the helicopter corridor. As the airplane on approach is supposed to be at about 250 ft when crossing this corridor, there is no way a 200 ft separation could ever have been achieved.
500' is also the VFR and IFR vertical offset standard. If unable to achieve, should not be allowed. 200' leg must be to be 500' below south flow DCA departures, so North flow arrivals need a better gate.
Subjects
DCA
IFR
Separation (ALL)
TCAS (All)
TCAS RA
VFR
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February 01, 2025, 16:48:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819158
Some folks here need to read back through the thread before posting.
The helicopter crew is said to have had NVG's but at this point no information has been provided re their use of NVG's.
The height issue is not the primary issue as the intent of the procedures and ATC instructions was to separate the two aircraft.
Had that separation effort worked there would have been no conflict thus no collision.
It is the failure of the separation and the meeting over the river the two aircraft in the same bit of air that height mattered.
No where in the standard procedure was it intended to have helicopter traffic fly below landing aircraft on RWY 33.
Poll the Pilots here folks....ask them if they would routinely fly 100-200 feet below a crossing aircraft? What do you think the answer would be?
I thank 212 Man for his input reminding me why he was the Teacher's Pet. I depend upon his ability to get into the books to keep me straight.
Now a test question for him.....were you flying the incident airplane doing a Visual Approach to RWY33....would you have tuned up the IAP for that RWY as an additional reference for your approach?
SOP's usually instruct Crews to use ILS data when doing Visual Approaches to runways with that kind of IAP so would that kind of thinking apply in this incident? Would that have been of any benefit considering the existing weather and terrain? Or, would that have been a distraction?
This was not a "Circling Approach" but it was very similar.
The helicopter crew is said to have had NVG's but at this point no information has been provided re their use of NVG's.
The height issue is not the primary issue as the intent of the procedures and ATC instructions was to separate the two aircraft.
Had that separation effort worked there would have been no conflict thus no collision.
It is the failure of the separation and the meeting over the river the two aircraft in the same bit of air that height mattered.
No where in the standard procedure was it intended to have helicopter traffic fly below landing aircraft on RWY 33.
Poll the Pilots here folks....ask them if they would routinely fly 100-200 feet below a crossing aircraft? What do you think the answer would be?
I thank 212 Man for his input reminding me why he was the Teacher's Pet. I depend upon his ability to get into the books to keep me straight.
Now a test question for him.....were you flying the incident airplane doing a Visual Approach to RWY33....would you have tuned up the IAP for that RWY as an additional reference for your approach?
SOP's usually instruct Crews to use ILS data when doing Visual Approaches to runways with that kind of IAP so would that kind of thinking apply in this incident? Would that have been of any benefit considering the existing weather and terrain? Or, would that have been a distraction?
This was not a "Circling Approach" but it was very similar.
Subjects
ATC
Circle to Land (Deviate to RWY 33)
DCA
Night Vision Goggles (NVG)
Separation (ALL)
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February 01, 2025, 16:56:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819165
Re hovering on the helicopter routes: Perusing some forums where Army pilots post several of them recounted being told to go hover over X point while traffic cleared at DCA. Not all controllers seem willing to run traffic as close together as this one did.
Subjects
DCA
Hover
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February 01, 2025, 17:37:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819189
local helo
Are there any non-local pilots flying that route?
I have only once flown into the Washington area, and it was more than a decade ago in a light single. I seem to recall DCA required special training even for airline pilots.
Is that not the case now or not for helicopter pilots? I thought it was a case where you need to be familiar to use those routes.
I have only once flown into the Washington area, and it was more than a decade ago in a light single. I seem to recall DCA required special training even for airline pilots.
Is that not the case now or not for helicopter pilots? I thought it was a case where you need to be familiar to use those routes.
I fly in the DC FRZ and you hear the helo folks on freq all day, ( a lot of Coast Guard, various DoD, various fed LEO, some medivac and lifeguard) and they all know every inch of the area . Also surprising to listen to is that helo pilots through the FRZ are pretty much self-directed and entrusted with self sufficiency that fixed wing traffic is not . They've all been vetted, fingerprinted, have their own squawks etc and so ATC gives them a lot of respect. They announce intentions to 'fly route X' or 'request direct Andrews', and ATC is able to understand their intentions and clears a path and approves - and then you don't hear a peep from them until they reach the endpoint - then they announce next intention like "Field in sight'" -> "contact Andrews tower on..., Freq change approved" -> "good day" and the whole 20 minutes had a total of three radio calls. .
They seem to all know what they're doing and it's nobody's giving off the vibe that it's any kind of initial training for anything - you don't hear ATC having to telling them to 'say altitude' or 'turn left 10 degrees' or really anything, and you don't hear the pilots giving half arsed requests. [This level of trust might have had consequences, but I'll defer my judgement]
For all helo pilots local knowledge is a survival. Lots of civi helos in DC are based out of KFME, and the ones I know every inch of territory, every local landmark, overpass, bridge, body of water within the DC beltway like the back of their hand - one guy knows off the top of his head if every single road is asphalt or concrete, light or unlight, etc. Similar experience when I met news chopper folks based in the Valley - they knew hundreds of places in greater Los Angeles that I never even heard of.
Landmarks in DC are hard to miss, basically every one knows where the WW bridge, Hanes Point, the route of the Potomac, etc.. DCA is strangely popular for plane watching (there's rec areas to view at each end) so an absurdly large number of non-av people in the area are familiar with how the traffic flow works. I kayak right below the crash area and when wind is out of North, you can see landing lights of 7+ sequenced arrivals coming up the Potomac, it's basically impossible to miss the incoming landing parade and even non-av people get the concept. The WW bridge would seem to me a good point of reference for a callout, everybody knows where to immediately look. It's hard to think that the IP didn't understand local reference of the ATC traffic advisory.
Subjects
ATC
DCA
PAT25
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February 01, 2025, 18:13:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819206
landing 33
Having coffee this morning with my friend (my old CFI) who's a FO for one of the other American Eagle providers based at DCA, his opinion was that since that 5,200 ft on RWY33 is sufficient for an RJ, the primary reason he gets sidestepped to 33 about half the time is that it ends very close to the American's regional jet terminal and that using RWY33 saves wasting a couple hundred bucks to taxi for no reason which adds up with their large amount of activity. I don't fly there but as pax I on an RJ, with those winds in VFR, in my experience we landed 33 maybe 40% of the time.
My friend doesn't speak for all the RJ pilots obviously, but he didn't consider this sidestep to 31 to be at all unexpected or in his mind adding any significant risk and mentioned it was part of his localization checkout (his company has specific ground and line training required for the airfield). Most tellingly, he literally said it was not on his Top Ten gripes about DCA (he likes to complain a bit 😀
Subjects
ATC
CRJ
Circle to Land (Deviate to RWY 33)
DCA
VFR
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February 01, 2025, 20:50:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819292
- Thanks to Henra for reminding us that the ATC radar displays altitudes to the nearest 100 \xb150'
- The nytimes.com images of heli positions outside the depicted corridors posted by fdr in #578 is massive evidence of normalisation of deviance
- I am beginning to suspect that the CAs noted by the controller are a commonplace occurrence. It would be interesting to learn the frequency of DCA CAs between the helicopters and traffic on approach and departure. How much and how long has deviance been normalized?
- The CRJ crew was left out of the information loop. I have a dedicated traffic display on the top of my glider panel which shows ADS-B and Flarm traffic. A similar display would have enabled the CRJ crew to monitor traffic and get the hell out of the way when necessary.
Subjects
ADSB (All)
ATC
CRJ
DCA
Radar
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February 01, 2025, 21:58:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819334
Airline pilots do not, as a matter of course, avoid TCAS traffic unless given an RA, TCAS is notoriously inaccurate laterally, we will try to acquire traffic visually and may then react IF we can.
Also depending on the range selected on the TCAS or ND display you might get a load of garbled nonesense.
Also depending on the range selected on the TCAS or ND display you might get a load of garbled nonesense.
Also, with any kind of warning system, they lose effectiveness with the more that they go off. A full-blooded TCAS RA is, thankfully, pretty rare on an individual basis (I\x92ve had 3 over 30 years, two in the USA) and is trained and practiced regularly. The CA/STCA that ATC received might have been the 27th of the day in that airspace for all we know, given the traffic levels and the routings in and out of DCA and criss-crossing the area, plus they did have confirmation of visual acquisition which was now the sole means of separation.
Subjects
ATC
DCA
Separation (ALL)
TCAS (All)
TCAS RA
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February 01, 2025, 23:39:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819382
Not necessarily disagreeing that it's not the most ideal operation, but I am not sure if operators consider it messy. This is extremely common. With winds from N in VFR, there's usually just the one sequenced traffic flow coming north up the river, and then on final ATC is giving clearance to landing visual or ILS RWY1, or depending on timing, sidestepping some RJ traffic over to a visual RWY33. You can look on Flightaware for the that airframe and a week or so ago prior to mishap, they landed 33 not once but twice (once in dark) the same day.
Having coffee this morning with my friend (my old CFI) who's a FO for one of the other American Eagle providers based at DCA, his opinion was that since that 5,200 ft on RWY33 is sufficient for an RJ, the primary reason he gets sidestepped to 33 about half the time is that it ends very close to the American's regional jet terminal and that using RWY33 saves wasting a couple hundred bucks to taxi for no reason which adds up with their large amount of activity. I don't fly there but as pax I on an RJ, with those winds in VFR, in my experience we landed 33 maybe 40% of the time.
My friend doesn't speak for all the RJ pilots obviously, but he didn't consider this sidestep to 31 to be at all unexpected or in his mind adding any significant risk and mentioned it was part of his localization checkout (his company has specific ground and line training required for the airfield). Most tellingly, he literally said it was not on his Top Ten gripes about DCA (he likes to complain a bit 😀
Having coffee this morning with my friend (my old CFI) who's a FO for one of the other American Eagle providers based at DCA, his opinion was that since that 5,200 ft on RWY33 is sufficient for an RJ, the primary reason he gets sidestepped to 33 about half the time is that it ends very close to the American's regional jet terminal and that using RWY33 saves wasting a couple hundred bucks to taxi for no reason which adds up with their large amount of activity. I don't fly there but as pax I on an RJ, with those winds in VFR, in my experience we landed 33 maybe 40% of the time.
My friend doesn't speak for all the RJ pilots obviously, but he didn't consider this sidestep to 31 to be at all unexpected or in his mind adding any significant risk and mentioned it was part of his localization checkout (his company has specific ground and line training required for the airfield). Most tellingly, he literally said it was not on his Top Ten gripes about DCA (he likes to complain a bit 😀
The problem with systemic failures is the come along looking like excellent alternatives until the wheels fall off the wagon and it ends in tears. You have to be lucky 100% of the time, the grim reaper only needs one win.
Subjects
ATC
Circle to Land (Deviate to RWY 33)
DCA
Route 4
VFR
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February 02, 2025, 00:43:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819413
Having coffee this morning with my friend (my old CFI) who's a FO for one of the other American Eagle providers based at DCA, his opinion was that since that 5,200 ft on RWY33 is sufficient for an RJ, the primary reason he gets sidestepped to 33 about half the time is that it ends very close to the American's regional jet terminal and that using RWY33 saves wasting a couple hundred bucks to taxi for no reason which adds up with their large amount of activity. I don't fly there but as pax I on an RJ, with those winds in VFR, in my experience we landed 33 maybe 40% of the time.
Subjects
DCA
VFR
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February 02, 2025, 02:19:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11819453
Also that plot might include times when helo pilots get other routing due to no DCA traffic. Speculating, but some of those points are pretty close to the airport.
Last edited by YRP; 2nd February 2025 at 02:34 .
Subjects
DCA
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