Pass Behind (All) Page: 1 of 6

BFSGrad
January 30, 2025, 05:23:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11816892

Quote:

Originally Posted by Capi_Cafre'

A late change to 33 had the potential to put the jet low and in conflict with the helicopter corridor.

Don\x92t think it was a late change. Listening to LiveATC, local controller (LC) calls the CRJ at 1200 ft, inbound 33, over the Wilson Bridge as a traffic advisory to PAT25. Don\x92t hear reply but it sounds like LC then says \x93visual separation approved.

LC then approves AAL1630 for immediate takeoff runway 1 with advisory of CRJ on 2-mile left base for 33.

LC queries PAT25 \x93do you have the CRJ in sight\x94? No reply heard but LC then directs PAT25 to pass behind the CRJ.

PAT25 may have been watching next in sequence, AAL3130, landing runway 1, instead of CRJ.

Subjects ATC CRJ PAT25 Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Pass Behind (PAT25) Separation (ALL)

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cbradio
January 30, 2025, 08:50:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817004

Quote:

Originally Posted by Gne

The first lesson for surveillance controllers (and daughters learning to drive in roundabout country) - if the relative bearing is not changing - DO SOMETHING!!!

Gne

I "think" the ATC did. "Traffic sighted?" - "Pass behind."

Subjects ATC Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Relative Bearing

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bigjames
January 30, 2025, 09:34:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817049

If the Heli said he would pass behind the aircraft on approach and that aircraft was behind the incident aircraft, then it makes even less sense.

Subjects Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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Avv
January 30, 2025, 10:18:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817091

Quote:

Originally Posted by bigjames

If the Heli said he would pass behind the aircraft on approach and that aircraft was behind the incident aircraft, then it makes even less sense.

Unlikely that they mistook the CRJ, It's landing lights were pointing right at them. More likely they weren't sure where they were in relation to the plane and where it was going. From the radar plot they are head on, then the CRJ turns final to 33 and the Blackhawk turns right to avoid them. Too high and in the wrong spot.

Subjects Blackhawk (H-60) CRJ Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Radar

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ATC Watcher
January 30, 2025, 12:44:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817200

Quote:

Originally Posted by chuks

This might come down to the helo crew simply picking out the wrong aircraft on final, Number 2 instead of Number 1..

Unlikely that one I would say because he was cleared to go behind, ,, it would then have to make a sharp left urn then , not a slight right one ..as it looks like he did on he FR24 track.

Subjects Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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Flava Saver
January 30, 2025, 13:41:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817245

Back here, ATC will generally say \x93callsign, traffic is (whatever) 5 miles, in your 9 o\x92clock, a Boeing 737, report in sight, and pass behind, caution possible wake turbulence\x85\x94

Not saying it\x92s atc\x92s fault in this instance\x85. Just maybe some more info? Who knows\x85. What a bloody tragedy.

Subjects ATC Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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WHBM
January 30, 2025, 13:42:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817246

It looks like there was a close sequence of arrivals to runway 1. The accident aircraft was asked late in the process (though normal at DCA) if they would sidestep, right then left, onto runway 33, crossing runway 1 but helping with clearing that for the arrival behind. This doesn't seem to have been specifically passed to the helo crew, who were just asked to "go behind". So from a stream of arrivals in front of them all to their right of the river, suddenly here's one swinging out of the final approach line in the dark towards them, then swinging back.

And the helo was apparently flown by a trainee ...

Subjects Circle to Land (Deviate to RWY 33) DCA Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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canyonblue737
January 30, 2025, 14:44:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817292

Quote:

Originally Posted by SINGAPURCANAC

Shouldnt it be:
Pat 25 traffic at 11 o clock 3 miles, crj following ils for rwy 33, report in sight
??

yes. if you look at the longer transcripts his initial call of the traffic was exactly that format and the helicopter acknowledges the traffic in sight and is approved visual separation. they some time later 30-60 seconds at least (maybe more) there are the more common published transcripts where the controller uses non standard phraseology in quick succession to attempt to point out and ask he helicopter to pass behind the traffic. the non-standard phraseology and voice is clearly stressed because its the moment in time the ATC controller becomes first concerned by the proximity of the helicopter and airplane and clearly he is making a quick call to try to see if the helicopter still "has him in sight" or if he needs to take action (like sending the CRJ around). unfortunately after the second quick non standard call the helicopter again responds they have the traffic in sight and will maintain visual separation. perhaps 10-15 seconds later the midair occurs. detailed audio long before and after the incident is here:

Subjects ATC CRJ Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Phraseology (ATC) Separation (ALL) Traffic in Sight Visual Separation

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Pilot DAR
January 30, 2025, 14:55:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817305

My first of a number of startling events relating to "seeing" traffic announced to me by ATC taught me a valuable lesson: I was told to pass behind two F-4 Phantoms on long final, 2 Phantoms in sight, and I watched them, 'cause they were cool... Then two more blasted right across in front of me! Adequately safely distant, but scary! Lesson for pilots, once you see and report in sight, ask yourself if there could be another you have not seen yet - and leek looking, checking back on the one you've spotted, particularly if you have a second pilot with you! For ATC, sure announce to presence of traffic which may be in conflict, but also state other relevant (distracting/misunderstandable) traffic if time permits. That ATC was not busy, and could have told me that there were four Phantoms total. My tactic to see, acknowledge, then keep looking more aircraft elsewhere, has rewarded me many times since, even once as third jumpseat observer. This is a simple safety skill in any visual flying environment, particularly at night, and in a busy lights area...

Subjects ATC Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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BFSGrad
January 30, 2025, 15:47:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817345

Observations after listening to the KDCA 134.35 audio file:

After LC provides CRJ at Wilson Bridge/1200ft/runway 33 traffic advisory, PAT25 requests visual separation, which LC immediately approves. This is several minutes prior to the collision.

LC is working at least 2 other helos in addition to PAT25.

PAT25 is responding to LC on VHF 134.35. LC is simultaneously transmitting on 119.1 and 134.35 so both PAT25 and the CRJ were hearing all LC transmissions but each was not hearing the others replies.

Immediately prior to the collision when the LC queries if PAT25 has the CRJ in sight and to pass behind the CRJ, the immediate response is “[unclear] has the aircraft in sight, request visual separation” to which the LC immediately responds “approved.” The voice sounded the same as earlier PAT25 transmissions. If so, the non-urgent tone of the reply would indicate that PAT25 had no indication that a collision was imminent and was likely looking at the wrong aircraft.

Subjects CRJ Frequency 119.1 Frequency 134.35 KDCA PAT25 Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Separation (ALL) Visual Separation

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WHBM
January 30, 2025, 17:16:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817425

The sudden right turn by the helo in the final moments is surprising, but I wonder, given the bland "Can you see the CRJ", followed by "Pass behind the CRJ", whether they were actually looking, in the dark through their night vision goggles, at the aircraft lined up on 01 which was just starting its takeoff run. "Can you see it". There it is, down there. "Pass behind it". OK, let's turn now to pass behind it.

Subjects CRJ Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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EFHF
January 30, 2025, 17:27:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817434

Quote:

Originally Posted by SASless

Do standard IAP Procedures by Airlines require use of Glide Slope information even when VFR.....which would make me ask the question what height the RJshould have been at at the point it collided with t he helicopter.

According to the simulation by VAS, the collision happened between the center and the east bank of the river, approximately at 38.84298, -77.02531, which is 4200 ft from the threshold, so at 3 degree glide slope the correct height for an ILS approach would have been 220 ft AGL. But there was no ILS procedure.

In any case there could not have been any reasonable horizontal separation even if the helo flew within the helo route altitude restrictions. TWR gave instructions for lateral separation with this call:

Quote:

PAT25, pass behind the CRF.

Last edited by EFHF; 30th January 2025 at 18:00 . Reason: Error in TDZ location corrected, AGL was 175 ft before correction

Subjects PAT25 Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Pass Behind (PAT25) Route Altitude Separation (ALL)

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Hot 'n' High
January 30, 2025, 17:31:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817442

Quote:

Originally Posted by WHBM

On NVGs, just my thoughts but the can some RW Mil people comment on NGVs in a built-up area? The work to make the cockpit NVG-compatible is very significant (I did get involved with that side - all sorts of lights have to be replaced) and, when flying in trail on NVGs, only the rear aircraft had it's Nav lights on so the aircraft in front does not blind the crew behind. IR cameras in a built-up area is one thing (as in the police chasing down crims!) but NVG in a heavily built-up area? That's a whole new ball-game. With the stuff I dealt with that was impossible! Things may have changed. Be interested to know!

Subjects CRJ Night Vision Goggles (NVG) Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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Lomon
January 30, 2025, 19:50:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817595

Quote:

Originally Posted by WHBM

The sudden right turn by the helo in the final moments is surprising , but I wonder, given the bland "Can you see the CRJ", followed by "Pass behind the CRJ", whether they were actually looking, in the dark through their night vision goggles, at the aircraft lined up on 01 which was just starting its takeoff run. "Can you see it". There it is, down there. "Pass behind it". OK, let's turn now to pass behind it.

Could the sudden right turn be last minute (second) avoiding action when the RW pilots realised they were about to collide with an airliner?

The helicopter was tracking in southerly direction with the airliner passing left to right in front of them. A right turn is the obvious avoiding action as a last ditch manoeuvre to avoid a collision.

Subjects CRJ Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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Rushed Approach
January 30, 2025, 21:37:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817673

Not if at the point he got the instruction he had yet to intercept the 01 approach track.

Before this intercept point he would turn right (which he did) to go behind the mis-identified traffic rather than in front of it.

Subjects Pass Behind Pass Behind (All)

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Rushed Approach
January 30, 2025, 22:19:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817705

Quote:

Originally Posted by Equivocal

From the comments on this thread, it seems like many are unclear about flight rules and responsibilities of pilots and ATC. I'm not suggesting that the rules are good or applied in an appropriate way but, simply, the rules are clear....even if understanding is not.

OK so what's your interpretation of the rules here then?

The airliner is under IFR rules on its flight plan until it gets changed to a different runway, when it's then VFR.

The chopper is under VFR, stooging along a river at 200 ft and avoiding traffic on approach to Reagan by visual clues alone.

Radar useless as the aircraft are too low.

Airliner TCAS useless as inhibited, even if it can decode the military transponder's data.

Radio situational awareness compromised as chopper on UHF, airliner on VHF. So each aircraft can neither hear the other nor the ATC instructions to that aircraft.

It's difficult to see aircraft at night against a backdrop of a city with thousands of lights. And when you're gonna hit something, as others have said, that light doesn't move relative to you, so you don't notice it - it just blends into the background lights.

It only takes the chopper to misidentify the aircraft it's supposed to go behind and to therefore turn into the path of the airliner it was supposed to avoid - draw the map with the vectors and it all makes sense. These two aircraft ended up in the Potomac, but they could have ended up in much worse places in terms of loss of life on the ground.

Seems to me it's been an accident waiting to happen for some time.

Subjects ATC Accident Waiting to Happen IFR Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Radar Situational Awareness TCAS (All) VFR

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alfaman
January 30, 2025, 22:35:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817716

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rushed Approach

OK so what's your interpretation of the rules here then?

The airliner is under IFR rules on its flight plan until it gets changed to a different runway, when it's then VFR.

The chopper is under VFR, stooging along a river at 200 ft and avoiding traffic on approach to Reagan by visual clues alone.

Radar useless as the aircraft are too low.

Airliner TCAS useless as inhibited, even if it can decode the military transponder's data.

Radio situational awareness compromised as chopper on UHF, airliner on VHF. So each aircraft can neither hear the other nor the ATC instructions to that aircraft.

It's difficult to see aircraft at night against a backdrop of a city with thousands of lights. And when you're gonna hit something, as others have said, that light doesn't move relative to you, so you don't notice it - it just blends into the background lights.

It only takes the chopper to misidentify the aircraft it's supposed to go behind and to therefore turn into the path of the airliner it was supposed to avoid - draw the map with the vectors and it all makes sense. These two aircraft ended up in the Potomac, but they could have ended up in much worse places in terms of loss of life on the ground.

Seems to me it's been an accident waiting to happen for some time.

I can't speak for the USA, but my understanding was always that the flight rules for the CRJ don't change, unless the crew cancel their IFR plan: ie flying a visual approach doesn't change the flight rule status. The crew can still expect IFR separation from other IFR & SVFR flights, & traffic information on conflicting VFR flights.

Subjects ATC Accident Waiting to Happen CRJ IFR Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Radar Separation (ALL) Situational Awareness TCAS (All) VFR

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canigida
January 30, 2025, 23:24:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817756

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rushed Approach

"It's difficult to see aircraft at night against a backdrop of a city with thousands of lights." - DC isn't actually that big of a city or that brightly lit, and it seems the UH-60 was heading south west, well away from DC toward a not very dense part of suburban N. Virginia. Mostly they would see a very wide part of the Potomac river ahead, and in the distance on the western shore is a Daingerfield island (US park service land and mostly unlit), the GW parkway going N/S for a couple hundred meters (all the parkways are dangerously unlit IMO) followed by some low level typical suburb condos of a couple stories towards Potomac Yard, which other than street lights or the sign from Target is not very bright. I kayak there all the time and there's nothing much to see looking westward. I've been out of KVKX at night and can see that area and it's not dazzling.

"Radar useless as the aircraft are too low." - It seems there's valid radar returns from both aircraft. the FAA has a good diagram of the Potomac TRACON radar sites, about 10 different radars, and having visited the TRACON several times, they readily explain there's another nearly facility that is a duplicate of their radar feed, but for national security. I assume there's coverage till the river service for security to prevent someone from sneaking up the river with bad ideas

"Radio situational awareness compromised as chopper on UHF, airliner on VHF. " - I fly in the area and in my experience everyone is on the same VHF, they might be also duped to UHF and can hear everybody on my handheld. You hear AF-1 all the time on freq.

"The chopper is under VFR, stooging along a river at 200 ft and avoiding traffic" - Most of the area NE of the airfield in a prohibited area, and there's a lot of military installations within 5 miles of DC that they are shuttling around, so that path seems perfectly acceptable given the numerous constraints. there's nothing wrong with a helo corridor as long as you stay within it and maintain the prescribed altitude. Also, it's not like KDCA is some secret place, the flight paths are pretty well known if that's where you work. It's popular to sit in parks on both ends and watch the planes, there's literally millions of local people that know exactly the planes are coming and going on both directions. so if you're a helo there, you know where the hot spots are. Likewise, its not just any helo in that area, everyone is vetted, fingerprinted in the inner FRZ.

" on approach to Reagan by visual clues alone" - The UH-60 was not going to DCA, the assumption was it was using the helo route 4 corridor. All the UH-60Ls I've seen have full glass with moving map and I'm assuming a magenta line for the helo corridor.

Fun Fact - Calling it "Reagan" will get you tarred and feathered in the area. Folks refuse to utter the name and for years (decades) the Metro refused to rename the station until legally forced.

Last edited by Senior Pilot; 31st January 2025 at 00:05 . Reason: Prescribed/proscribed

Subjects ATC Accident Waiting to Happen DCA FAA Hot Spots IFR KDCA Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Radar Route 4 Situational Awareness TCAS (All) VFR

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digits_
January 30, 2025, 23:36:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817762

Assuming the youtube clips are accurate, why did ATC tell the helicopter to pass behind a CRJ when both aircraft were approaching each other head on? How would that even work?

And as stated by other people earlier, but it bears repeating, at night you're *never* sure what traffic you are seeing. Even during the day it's extremely hard to differentiate between different aircraft types. At night *everyone* is guessing that the light blob they see is a CRJ or a 737 or even a PC12 or a C172. Visual separation only works when it's not necessary: in low traffic areas.

And to deviate a little bit, I'm afraid the next incident will involve landing clearances to runways that are not clear at all.

Subjects ATC CRJ Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Separation (ALL) Visual Separation

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Pearly White
January 30, 2025, 23:53:00 GMT
permalink Post: 11817772

Quote:

Originally Posted by ATC Watcher

Unlikely that one I would say because he was cleared to go behind, ,, it would then have to make a sharp left urn then , not a slight right one ..as it looks like he did on he FR24 track.

If the UH60 pilot was, in fact, maintaining visual separation from the CRJ as claimed, none of us would be here discussing this.

The real problem here is expecting one pilot to be responsible for visual separation (at any time, but especially at night). At what point do we agree to release ATC from the responsibility of keeping us separated by sufficient margins? I know a miss is as good as a mile but if I've got a bunch of people sitting behind me, I'd prefer 500/1000 feet just to be on the safe side thanks.

Subjects ATC CRJ Pass Behind Pass Behind (All) Separation (ALL) Visual Separation

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