Black boxes in Washington air disaster recovered, US officials say

WASHINGTON - The US authorities said on Jan 30 that it was not yet clear why a regional jet collided with a US Army helicopter at a Washington airport, killing 67 people in the deadliest US air disaster in more than 20 years.

President Donald Trump said that federal diversity efforts could have been a factor, reiterating a theme that has become a focus of his presidency.

Rights groups and Democrats accused him of politicising the disaster.

The investigation into the crash in the nation’s capital has just begun.

The American Airlines Bombardier carrying 60 passengers and four crew members

collided with the Army Black Hawk helicopter

and crashed into the Potomac River as it prepared to land at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on the night of Jan 29.

The names of all the victims have not yet been released, but they included a number of

promising young figure skaters

and people from Kansas, where the flight originated.

Senator Maria Cantwell said that the dead also included citizens from Russia, the Philippines and Germany, and Chinese news agency Xinhua reported that two Chinese citizens had been killed in the crash.

The Singapore Government on Jan 31 conveyed its deepest condolences to the US government and to the families and loved ones of those who perished.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs added that the Singapore Embassy in Washington is in contact with the US authorities, and that there are no reports of Singaporeans affected thus far.

National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigators said they would have a preliminary report within 30 days. Investigators recovered the cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder from the Bombardier CRJ700 plane, the NTSB said.

The agency has begun collecting wreckage, including portions of the helicopter, and is storing it at a hangar at Reagan National Airport. Washington’s fire and emergency department said its divers had searched all accessible areas and would conduct additional searches for aircraft components on Jan 31.

US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said both aircraft had been flying standard flight patterns on Jan 29 and there had been no breakdown in communication.

Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin told Reuters: “Everything was routine up to the point of the accident.”

Washington’s primary airport is located just across the river in Virginia.

At the White House, Mr Trump criticised the helicopter pilots and suggested air traffic controllers were to blame.

“We do not know what led to this crash, but we have some very strong opinions and ideas,” he said.

Radio communications show that air traffic controllers alerted the helicopter about the jet.

One controller, rather than two, was handling local plane and helicopter traffic on the night of Jan 29 at Reagan National, a situation deemed “not normal” but considered adequate for lower volumes of traffic, according to a person briefed on the matter. The New York Times first reported the “not normal” description.

The decision to combine duties in the evening is not uncommon, the source said. 

A shortage of air traffic controllers in the US in recent years has spurred safety concerns. At several facilities, controllers work mandatory overtime and six-day work weeks to cover shortages.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has about 3,000 fewer controllers than it says it needs.

Crowded flight corridor

Airspace is frequently crowded in the US capital region, home to three commercial airports and several major military facilities, and officials have raised concerns about busy runways at Ronald Reagan National Airport. Several near-miss incidents at the airport have sparked alarm, including a near-collision in May 2024.

Mr Trump accused his Democratic predecessor Joe Biden of lowering hiring standards and suggested the FAA’s diversity push could have weakened its capabilities.

Asked if the crash was caused by diversity hiring, he said: “It just could have been.”

The Trump administration has not provided any proof to back these assertions, and there is no evidence that efforts to make the federal workforce more diverse have compromised air safety.

Mr Trump has moved quickly to quash federal diversity initiatives since taking office on Jan 20, drawing criticism from rights advocates who fear he is rolling back progress the US has made to overcome its history of discrimination.

“The President has made his decision to put politics over people abundantly clear as he uses the highest office in the land to sow hatred rooted in falsehoods instead of providing us with the leadership we need and deserve,” Mr Derrick Johnson, president of the NAACP civil rights group, said in a statement.

Mr Trump cited FAA policies stating that physical and mental disabilities would not on their own disqualify applicants from a controller’s position. Those policies were in place throughout Mr Trump’s initial 2017-2021 White House term, according to aides to Mr Biden’s transportation secretary, Mr Pete Buttigieg.

Mr Buttigieg called Mr Trump’s remarks despicable. “As families grieve, Mr Trump should be leading, not lying,” he said on social media.

Crash cause unclear

Mr Trump’s remarks contrasted sharply with those of other officials, who said there was no immediate indication why the crash took place.

American Airlines chief executive officer Robert Isom said the pilot of American Eagle Flight 5342 had about six years of flying experience. The Bombardier CRJ700 jet was operated by PSA Airlines, a regional subsidiary.

Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth said the helicopter was flown by a “fairly experienced crew” of three soldiers who were wearing night-vision goggles on an annual training flight.

Officials said they were grounding other flights from the Army unit involved in the crash and would re-evaluate training exercises in the region.

‘A fireball’

Air traffic control recordings appear to capture the final communications with the helicopter, call sign PAT25, before it collided with the jet. “PAT25, do you have a CRJ in sight? PAT25, pass behind the CRJ,” a controller says at 8.47pm local time on Jan 29 (9.47am on Jan 30 Singapore time), according to a recording on liveatc.net.

Seconds later, another aircraft calls in to air traffic control, saying: “Tower, did you see that?” It was apparently referring to the crash. An air traffic controller then redirects planes heading to the same runway to go around.

“I just saw a fireball and then it was just gone. I haven’t seen anything since they hit the river,” an air traffic controller says.

Webcam video of the crash showed the collision and an explosion lighting up the night sky.

It was the deadliest US air disaster since November 2001, when an American Airlines jet crashed after departing from John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, killing all 260 people on board and five people on the ground.

Reagan National’s main runway is the busiest in the US, with over 800 daily takeoffs and landings.

The NTSB has investigated nine accidents or incidents at the airport this century, including two that were fatal, records showed. REUTERS