In the late January of 2025, Washington DC was struck with a terrible tragedy which shook up everyone’s lives with a fluke accident. An American Airlines flight collided midair with a military helicopter, causing the deaths of 67 people, 64 of whom were civilians. The cleanup of this mess has been difficult, but people in DC and in the surrounding areas continue to work tirelessly to help everyone in need.
This American Airlines commercial flight was a small, regional flight that departed from Wichita, Kansas earlier that day, and was arriving at Reagan Airport in Washington, DC that night. This was a very small flight, and had only 60 passengers, two crew members, and two pilots. The US Army helicopter was carrying three army personnel, one of whom was undergoing her annual night-flying evaluation. The area that both of the aircrafts were flying in is a highly controlled part of the air. This is because of the close proximity to the white house, and other official government buildings in DC. This means that everyone who flies in this area has to be on higher alert because of the restrictions put in place.
Originally, the commercial flight was set to land on a different, longer runway which is in a different part of the airport. But right before the flight started its descent, a traffic controller from Reagan airport asked the pilots to land on runway 33, which is a much shorter runway in a different part of the airport. This runway can only be used by smaller aircrafts, so this relatively small commercial flight could land on it successfully. The pilots agreed to landing on it, which turned out to be a fatal mistake.
As the plane started its descent, the helicopter was nearby. Normally helicopters would not be flying in this area at this time of day, but one happened to be. If the traffic controller knew this, they would not have told the plane to switch runways to land on, because they would have realized that a collision would be possible. But unfortunately, they were not aware of this, and this led to horrible tragedy that occurred. The two aircrafts collided right over the Potomac River, and all 67 passengers (64 on the plane and 3 on the helicopter) unfortunately were lost.
This is the first major plane crash in the US since 2009. Although this shows how safe air travel normally is, freak accidents like this can, and do happen. This event just pushes everyone to be safer and more aware of the dangers relating to air travel.
