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| BFSGrad
April 01, 2025, 22:33:00 GMT permalink Post: 11858934 |
The NTSB preliminary report states that about 4% of DCA\x92s arrivals use runway 33. With 25,000 monthly flights, you can do the math. 33 used more frequently than average in the winter due to the typical strong NW winds seen in the DC area. That was the case on 1/29. While it may be a wishful narrative that pilots get sent to ATC jail if \x93unable,\x94 doubt that\x92s anywhere close to the truth. I think the reality is if a pilot states \x93unable,\x94 ATC makes the necessary adjustments, which may involve an aircraft being resequenced in the queue. Don\x92t really think ATC has the authority to deny an aircraft a landing clearance out of spite if flight planned for DCA. And just as the collision was occurring, JIA5347 was checking in on the Mount Vernon Visual specifically requesting 33 . Luck of the draw\x85 Subjects
ATC
DCA
NTSB
Preliminary Report
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| Hot 'n' High
April 20, 2025, 21:30:00 GMT permalink Post: 11870704 |
....... Regrets: in my post trying to comment on Sailvi767's observation regarding the RJ crew having the best situational awareness, in retrospect I should have emphasized and explained what I meant by using the the word "imminent". The thread previously did clearly reference factors such as the inhibition of TAs and RAs at specified heights, and the TA alert. What seemed different in the post about the RJ crew's SA was what I, as only SLF/attorney, understood as the suggestion that a different crew with different mindset might have realized before the last second prior to impact that "erring on the side of caution" was the correct action to take. ...........
The baseline is that a TA on it's own is not enough and can even lead to issues if reacted to without knowing exactly where that contact is and what it is doing. You should, if you have the time (hence my comment re workload for the RJ crew at that point), try and get visual on the traffic but, tbh, it's very difficult to do, especially at low level at night against backlighting. You don't even really have time to "debate" a "shall we react (against SOP) to (yet another?) TCAS alert at DCA?" with all else that is going on at that point of a flight. SOP/Training says "fly on"! You need compelling evidence to go against that. I fact, IIR, the NTSB noted that the CRJ had full "up" elevator at the time of impact - that implies the crew finally saw the helo and reacted ..... but with no time to change their flight path. If you want to "do" the airline - I feel a much better case could be made based on the fact the evidence of issues for that approach at DCA was sat in the Safety Databases for anyone who went looking, that maybe even crews had raised the issue themselves through internal reporting in the Airline, and/or there was no process in place within the Airline to review operations into DCA - or any other airport. This is promoted by the FAA who state that "The [airline] SMS promotes a defined structure and a \x93learning culture\x94 within an aviation organization that continually seeks and analyzes information, then turns that information into action that eliminates or mitigates safety risks, before they become unwanted events.". The full ref is here. And that also applies equally to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority who I believe operate DCA as an independent organisation. How the MWAA fit in to US Government - I'm not sure! Anyway, hope this helps. Cheers, H 'n' H Subjects
CRJ
DCA
FAA
NTSB
Situational Awareness
TCAS (All)
TCAS RA
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| RatherBeFlying
April 21, 2025, 16:55:00 GMT permalink Post: 11871078 |
As earlier mentioned, TAs (Tower and TCAS) may among other incidents and excursions find their way into databases including ASIAS. Once the NTSB dug into the databases, it came up with a long history of losses of separation at a frequency that makes one wonder that such an accident hadn't happened earlier. I suspect that this is not solely a DCA problem.
But who should be watching the data for trends - individual regionals, individual majors, local military, local ATC, individual airport authorities, FAA, NTSB? Subjects
ATC
DCA
FAA
NTSB
Separation (ALL)
TCAS (All)
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| Hot 'n' High
April 21, 2025, 20:06:00 GMT permalink Post: 11871163 |
......... is promoted by the FAA who state that "The [airline or other aviation organisation] SMS promotes a defined structure and a \x93learning culture\x94 within an aviation organization that continually seeks and analyzes information, then turns that information into action that eliminates or mitigates safety risks, before they become unwanted events.". The full ref is
here.
........
Subjects
ATC
FAA
NTSB
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| Sailvi767
April 22, 2025, 19:09:00 GMT permalink Post: 11871756 |
"Originally Posted by
FullMetalJackass
If I get a traffic alert in my personal aircraft (I don't get RAs, just traffic warnings), I'm taking action to increase the altitude difference between me and the conflicting traffic. ." Yes, we are trained to use TAs to find traffic, and RAs to avoid, but I think 767 is right about things being different when you know that you wont get an RA. Subjects
NTSB
TCAS (All)
TCAS RA
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| Hot 'n' High
April 22, 2025, 22:03:00 GMT permalink Post: 11871844 |
....... You can as a pilot use your emergency authority to deviate from any clearance. Responding to a RA is mandatory. Responding to a traffic alert is up to the pilot flying. Yes they don\x92t want pilots routinely violating clearances for initial Traffic alerts. They want you to respond to the RA if it occurs. Many pilots do take action within their clearance to prevent a TA from becoming a RA. .........
I guess that dampens the urge to figure out what's going on with a TA, especially when on a relatively short Final where workload is high/time is in short supply/city lighting makes it very difficult. We don't know re this specific crew but it seems the Company regularly used 33 so that could be a factor - "Here we go again...... another TA........". As someone said, the "boiled frog" scenario. I still think that, while it's a valid thought of "what if they did......", I think it masks the more important aspect in that the overall design of that bit of airspace was rubbish - as was so eloquently put by the NTSB. Basically, the design stitched up the CRJ crew, the helo crew, the ATCO and the poor pax. Where else are there similarly wilting frogs? Thats the big question. Subjects
ATCO
CRJ
DCA
NTSB
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| BFSGrad
April 27, 2025, 17:19:00 GMT permalink Post: 11874462 |
This type of reporting does not serve aviation safety well. Apparently the editors at the NYT decided that, since nothing new had been reported about the DCA accident, it would be a good time to sweep together some of the facts currently known, add some informed speculation by \x93experts,\x94 and than \x93humanize\x94 the accident by adding photos and personal information about the people involved in the accident. Add in a bit of fact twisting and you have an article that will generate lots of clicks. One example: The article states, \x93the controller made a request that was permissible but atypical, according to the N.T.S.B. [5342 change from 1 to 33]. That last phrase \x93according to the NTSB\x94 is hyperlinked, with the linked document being the NTSB\x92s AIR-25-01 report. Does the NTSB report describe anything \x93atypical\x94 about changing to land on 33? No. In fact, the report makes this contrary statement: \x93Conducting northbound operations with simultaneous operations to runways 1 and 33 is a routine ATC procedure in compliance with FAA Order 7110.65BB.\x94 Even changing from 1 to 33 relatively late in the approach (which the NYT calls a \x93divert\x94), is routine for DCA. The evening of the accident, several aircraft operating both before and after 5342 were presented with this decision. One declined the switch to 33 and another specifically requeste d a change to 33. These decisions occurred after the aircraft had been handed off from PCT to the DCA LC and the aircraft were established inbound to runway 1. Subjects
ATC
DCA
FAA
NTSB
New York Times
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| BFSGrad
April 27, 2025, 20:22:00 GMT permalink Post: 11874540 |
I\x92ll make an assumption that this is the paragraph in the NYT article that you find compelling:
The helicopter crew appeared to have made more than one mistake. Not only was the Black Hawk flying too high, but in the final seconds before the crash, its pilot failed to heed a directive from her co-pilot, an Army flight instructor, to change course.
​​​​​​​CVR data indicated that, following this transmission, the IP told the pilot they believed ATC was asking for the helicopter to move left toward the east bank of the Potomac.
This is the danger of this type of sloppy media reporting. Subjects
ATC
Blackhawk (H-60)
NTSB
New York Times
Preliminary Report
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| WillowRun 6-3
April 28, 2025, 11:09:00 GMT permalink Post: 11874789 |
1. So if an "intolerable risk" is identified by the NTSB Chair, your view is that nonethless the pilot flying the helicopter necessarily was incompetent when that risk finally reached occurrence? The Swiss Cheese model requires accounting for all the holes in the block first of all existing somewhere, and then enough of them lining up - but not necessarily all of the holes lining up. The pilot might have been fully competent and might not have been - but the intolerable risk present in the airspace design makes it necessary to know a lot more relevant facts in the record to supoort a logical conclusion. Or perhaps you'll next assert that Chair Homendy is just covering for DEI. 2. Any second-year associate in a firm of more than three lawyers who has done nothing more than watch five depositions would raiload your argument to the extent it is based on the NYT's twisting of the summary of the CVR about turning left. Directive? Among other things, if the pilot flying was being "directed" then to the extent there is responsibility, it has to be mutual. 3. Whenever I read pieces like the one published in the NYT I wonder if one of the reporters has a close friend working on one of the lawsuits and is just trying to shape public opinion. Even if that speculation is merely a cheap shot, I didn't read anything in the piece which changed the level of "complexity" of the accident. Perhaps it was deeply hidden and required more reading between the lines. Regardless, its publication is a sorry excuse to jump far ahead of the investigations. Subjects
DEI
NTSB
NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy
New York Times
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| BFSGrad
May 02, 2025, 18:47:00 GMT permalink Post: 11877325 |
Back in my post #1385, I briefly mentioned some new info that the NTSB provided at the 3/27 Senate hearing regarding the NTSB’s investigation of the functionality of the 12th AB UH-60 fleet ADS-B systems. Below is the full transcript of the NTSB’s relevant testimony:
NTSB: One thing I can say on ADS-B Out OFF that’s policy of the Army. We are still looking at installation, programming and potential for equipment malfunction, and the reason that I mention this is because, for this accident helicopter, no ADS-B data had been received from an FAA ground station for 730 days prior to the accident and that was abnormal.
NTSB: So we began looking at the fleet for the battalion [12th AB]. The battalion had 25 helicopters that includes this particular helicopter. Nine of them were Mike models and all were transmitting ADS-B Out when they were turned ON because we have to verify that it’s working. There were 16 Limas including the accident helicopter, which we’re still looking at. Seven were transmitting when ADS-B Out was turned ON; eight were not and stopped doing so something between May and November 2023. We don’t know why. Five of those started transmitting since the NTSB identified the issue and began working with the Army to try to isolate the reason. So I just want to let you know that you can have ADS-B Out ON but you have to also make sure that it’s working. Sen. Moran: You indicated working with the Army, but there’s other participants in this arena. Were you narrowing it to the Army? Is there something necessarily wrong there or is there a problem more broadly in receiving the information? NTSB: For the ADS-B Out we wanted to look at the helicopter fleet for the battalion to see whether ADS-B Out, when turned ON, was actually transmitting data because we did think it was abnormal that, for the helicopter involved in the accident, wasn’t transmitting data for so long. Subjects
ADSB (All)
ADSB Out
DCA
FAA
NTSB
Route 9
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| WillowRun 6-3
May 03, 2025, 13:20:00 GMT permalink Post: 11877725 |
NTSB Newsroom:
"NTSB investigating Thursday's incidents at Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) in which a Delta Air Lines Airbus A319 and a Republic Airways Embraer E170 were instructed by air traffic control to perform go-arounds due to a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter inbound to the Pentagon." [Credit: post on X by NTSB Newsroom, seen as reply to post by @STATter911 (cited by LowObs); verified from NTSB webpage] Subjects
Blackhawk (H-60)
DCA
NTSB
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| WillowRun 6-3
July 30, 2025, 15:09:00 GMT permalink Post: 11930722 |
NTSB Hesring
The NTSB hearing on the accident is being live-streamed on PBS.org.
Subjects
NTSB
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| Musician
July 30, 2025, 16:22:00 GMT permalink Post: 11930758 |
Subjects
NTSB
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| MLHeliwrench
July 30, 2025, 16:41:00 GMT permalink Post: 11930785 |
NTSB published the animation for that investigative hearing at
https://youtu.be/SQm-fRrNMjM
. It didn't tell me anything new. The hearing itself is not on their youtube channel (yet).
So may 'what ifs' could change the outcome. A "caution - VFR helicopter traffic below - southbound along river" call out to the CRJ crew by ATC could of made the difference. The helciopter crew staying at or below 200 could of made the difference. Its amazing that this was considered "the norm" in that area. Subjects
ATC
CRJ
NTSB
Separation (ALL)
VFR
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| WillowRun 6-3
July 31, 2025, 04:34:00 GMT permalink Post: 11931045 |
After Day 1 , , , ,
Watched most of the hearing today.
Aviation community and espeically professionals (and others in cheap seats like mine) owe TAC a big Kudos! for the live updates. I'm not going to restate in depth one of the fundamental legal issues looming in the litigation in which this accident will be dissected; just a cursory summary, for context. The main defendants, from a liability standpoint, are the two federal government entities and not the airline - quite obviously because as someone upthread observed, the Bluestreak 5342 pilots "owned" the last segment of airspace to be traversed to the runway. Pulling the airline in for deep pockets and insurers is not the issue for liability analysis. But the federal government in all its actors and agents is protected by sovereign immunity. But -- it also has waived, in other words legally discontinued, its sovereign immunity (by the Federal Tort Claims Act) for many types of alleged wrongful acts. BUT -- there is an exception to its opening itself up to lawsuits - if the action or omission being challenged is a matter of "discretionary functions", in other words the making of policy, immunity is still in place. Only if the act or omission is a "ministerial function" is Uncle open to suit (Uncle Sam, that is). Generally, alleged failure to follow established rules and policies. Well, if I were in this case, I first would have hit the 7-11 for a six-pack of Giant Size energy drinks, because I would be awake for a week gathering cases and writing preliminary briefs about the glaring nature of the FAA's action - actually an omission - in not adding something on the order of "hot spot" or its equivalent to the pertinent charts. I mean, "policy factors" in that slippery bit of bureaucratic box-checking? (I wasn't tuned in for the exchange in which the FAA witness indicated - according to the TAC live update, that LAX had requested a similar notation relative to helicopter traffic, which FAA did add, but FAA did not suggest anything for DCA because DCA had only requested "hot spot" which, of course, is for surface congestion points not airspace. But FAA let the situation continue unabated, unaddressed? No wonder the cool-as-ice Chair is said to have lost it, her cool that is, over this FAA testimony.) Forecasting how legal issues will run and play out can be foolish indeed. Perhaps watching the NTSB "animation" - including actual video footage of the two aircraft colliding in mid-air - has wrenched my senses so as to yield a sense of blood in the water. Lawyer, sharks, their similiarities, all that trip. WillowRun 6-3 And Salute! to the Officer of the United States Army who expressed condolences to the families in attendance, before he started to answer a question that had been addressed to him. A class act, sir. Last edited by WillowRun 6-3; 31st July 2025 at 04:41 . Reason: Counsel prefer neatness, because it counts. Subjects
Accountability/Liability
DCA
FAA
NTSB
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| ozsmac
July 31, 2025, 11:49:00 GMT permalink Post: 11931249 |
I found the summary of day 1 of the hearings on the NTSB Newstalk podcast to be quite insightful. The discussions around altimeters, SOPs and charts was insightful (overblown by a few of the folks asking the questions).
https://www.aviationnewstalknetwork....ntsb-news-talk Subjects
NTSB
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| ATC Watcher
July 31, 2025, 17:48:00 GMT permalink Post: 11931466 |
I found the summary of day 1 of the hearings on the NTSB Newstalk podcast to be quite insightful. The discussions around altimeters, SOPs and charts was insightful (overblown by a few of the folks asking the questions).
https://www.aviationnewstalknetwork....ntsb-news-talk just a few : -UH60-L Heli altimeters accuracy .80 -130 ft systemic error due position of the static sensors affected by rotor blades in cruise -80 ft error deemed within acceptable tolerance by Army pilots -flying at 300ft targeting 200ft is "acceptable" by the Army -200ft restriction on the chart is a only a "recommended target" in VFR not a hard restriction i unless instructed by ATC .. -Lack of regulatory oversight by FAA despite many previous incidents . -FAA (bureaucratic) refusal to put a 'Hot spot" symbol on routes crossings. -Lack of ADS-B compliance on Army helis, due maintenance documentation errors during installation -lack of experience of heli pilots on specific areas due frequent rotation of staff and lack of training hours in general. -Lack of continuity in of DCA ATC operations supervision , 10 managers in 12 years and 5 in last 5 years. In fact on some of the Reason's layers there were more holes than cheese. Subjects
ADSB (All)
ATC
DCA
FAA
NTSB
VFR
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| ST Dog
August 01, 2025, 19:15:00 GMT permalink Post: 11932011 |
They weren't in a hover. And backwash, when in forward flight at 100 kts? Where are you coming up with this?
Do you understand what translational lift is? If they were flying at 100 kts (which is roughly what speed they seem to have been going) their static ports will work fine. Subjects
Hover
NTSB
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| Downwind_Left
August 01, 2025, 23:15:00 GMT permalink Post: 11932095 |
I\x92ve been listening to the NTSB hearings while doing other things last couple of days. All I can say is the FAA testimony is
wild
.
Normalisation of deviance doesn\x92t even come close. - Airspace design. The heli route stepping down to 200ft max lead some army pilots to believe it gave clearance from DCA traffic. Spoiler. It did not. - Controller workload \x93Just make it work\x94 was a common attitude at DCA - FAA not actively tracking TCAS RA \x93incidents\x94 as it could skew data.. maybe it was correctly applied visual separation etc. Need to look at the background etc. Yeah. But it generated an RA 🤬 - FAA refusing requests for traffic \x93hot spots\x94 on low level VFR charts as \x93hot spots\x94 are on ground charts only. - PAT25 wanted visual separation from the CRJ. ATC was required to inform the CRJ crew another aircraft was applying visual separation to them. They didn\x92t. Honestly from a European perspective. It\x92s quite bone chilling. I feel this was a systemic failure. Airspace design and Risk Normalisation. And my heartfelt condolences for the pilots, of both aircraft, and everyone else involved including the ATCOs. Not that there weren\x92t issues\x85 but in the Swiss cheese model, the FAA bought the cheese, drilled holes in it, and invited everyone to take a look inside. Slightly surprised by some NTSB comments as well\x85 they were presented that the heli was straight ahead on the CRJ TCAS simulation presentation. But in actual fact the CRJ was circling in a left turn for runway 33. It was stable at 500ft but in a left turn to line up with the runway\x85 wings level at 300ft. It was challenged by the airline/ALPA but I would hope the NTSB would have picked up on that. Low point of the whole hearing was Jennifer Homendy halting proceedings and moving witnesses to different seats, as one of the FAA managers elbowed a colleague while she was giving testimony - at which point she went quiet. Infernce being she was being reminded to stop talking. Subjects
ATC
CRJ
DCA
FAA
NTSB
NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy
PAT25
Separation (ALL)
TCAS (All)
TCAS RA
VFR
Visual Separation
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| Downwind_Left
August 02, 2025, 02:14:00 GMT permalink Post: 11932146 |
They managed to sink lower when questioned about SMS and just culture. They said they\x92d heard of it. But struggled to describe it\x85 especially when the NTSB questioned why so many people were reassigned to new jobs straight after the accident. Many questioned said, \x93I\x92ve only been in this job a month, so I can\x92t comment\x94. Again the formidable Jennifer called it out. The NTSB has seen this before\x85Radom job replacement, deniability etc Subjects
FAA
NTSB
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