FAA Confirms Shocking Government Failure At Pentagon In Wake Of Deadly D.C. Plane Crash
"before we resume any operations out of the Pentagon"
Female Black Hawk pilot didn't follow orders before horrific crash: Report
An Army VH-60M Black Hawk helicopter on a training exercise collided with a PSA Airlines plane operating an American Airlines flight near D.C.'s Ronald Reagan National Airport on Jan. 29. Sixty-seven people were killed, including three Army soldiers, 60 airline passengers, and four airline crew members.
As emergency responders futilely searched the frigid Potomac River for survivors, questions began to proliferate about how such a crash was possible, especially when Black Hawk helicopters routinely operate flights in the highly controlled air corridor around the airport without incident. Many suspected human error — and when the Army initially refused to name the female Black Hawk pilot, some critics hypothesized that DEI hiring practices might be indirectly at fault.
On the basis of government documents, interviews with relevant experts, and audio recordings of the air traffic controllers leading up to the collision, the New York Times delineated the "missteps" that led to the fatal January crash in a damning report on Sunday.
'PAT two-five, do you have the CRJ in sight?'
It turns out that Captain Rebecca Lobach — the doomed helicopter's pilot whose name was withheld at the outset — failed to heed her instructor's orders moments before flying into the inbound jet, and there is no indication she was suffering any health issues that may have been to blame.
The liberal publication appeared keen to displace the reason for the crash across multiple factors and mistakes, noting, for instance, that:
- the relevant tower controller was working double duty;
- the controller was unable to watch the helicopter's movements in real time via the Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast Out because the confidentiality of the Army aircraft's mission precluded the use of the system;
- the controller made the uncustomary decision of asking the ill-fated jet to land at Runway 33, one of the airport's ancillary runways;
- the vertical distance between the landing slope for a jet making its way to Runway 33 and the maximum permissible altitude for a helicopter along the route taken by the doomed Army aircraft would be a measly 75 feet;
- the helicopter was flying well over the mandated maximum altitude;
- the Army crew may have failed to catch a critical piece of information provided by the tower;
- the helicopter crew requested, then bungled a "visual separation" exercise, where the "pilot is meant to see neighboring air traffic, often without assistance from the controller, and avoid it by either hovering in place until the traffic passes or by flying around it in prescribed ways"; and
- the tower's alleged failure to notify both aircraft they were on a collision course.
Lobach, the highest-ranking soldier on the helicopter but far from the most experienced pilot aboard, was behind the controls as the helicopter neared the airport.
Cockpit voice recordings revealed that sometime after assuming control, Lobach announced an altitude of 300 feet. Chief Warrant Officer 2 Andrew Lloyd Eaves, her instructor, responded within a space of 39 seconds that they actually had an altitude of 400 feet — not only double the maximum height permissible near Runway 33 but 100 feet over the altitude mandated by the Federal Aviation Administration for that part of the route.
The Times indicated that as the helicopter approached the Key Bridge, from which the Army aircraft would head south along the river, Eaves indicated the helicopter was at 300 feet and descending to 200 feet.
Eaves apparently saw the need to repeat his instruction, telling Lobach that the chopper was at 300 feet and needed to descend.
'It could have well changed the outcome of that evening.'
While Lobach reportedly said she would comply, over two and half minutes later, she still had the helicopter at an altitude of over 200 feet — "a dangerously high level" according to the Times.
Moments later, the tower notified the Army crew that the inbound jet was "circling" to Runway 33 — a piece of information investigators believe was missed because someone aboard the helicopter was allegedly holding down the microphone key to speak, thereby blocking incoming communications.
Roughly two minutes before the collision, Eaves noted, "PAT two-five has traffic in sight." He then requested and was granted visual separation.
Nearly 20 seconds before impact — as doomed Flight 5342 made its turn toward Runway 33, flying at roughly 500 feet and now within a mile of the helicopter — the tower asked the Army crew, "PAT two-five, do you have the CRJ in sight?"
There was no response from the Black Hawk.
The controller then told the helicopter crew to "pass behind" the airplane, but Lobach kept flying directly at the inbound jet.
Two seconds after the controller's "pass behind" directive, Eaves said, "PAT two-five has the aircraft in sight. Request visual separation."
Inside the helicopter, Eaves told Lobach 15 seconds before the collision that air traffic control wanted her to turn left, toward the river — which would open more space between the Black Hawk and the jet, now at an altitude of approximately 300 feet.
Lobach reportedly did not heed the instruction, thereby guaranteeing the deaths of 66 people and herself.
At the time of the collision, one air traffic controller can reportedly be heard in a recording taken at the time saying, "Crash, crash, crash, this is an alert three."
"I just saw a fireball, and then it was just gone," said a controller. "I haven't seen anything since they hit the river, but it was a CRJ and a helicopter that hit. I would say maybe a half-mile off the approach end of 33."
Brig. Gen. Matthew Braman, the Army's director of aviation, told the Times, "I think what we'll find in the end is there were multiple things that, had any one of them changed, it could have well changed the outcome of that evening."
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Army VIP gold-top helicopter flights are common in busy DC air corridor
Army Black Hawk helicopters known as “gold-tops” operating out of Davison Army Airfield at Fort Belvoir, Va., are regularly used to ferry senior military officials to different installations and often make flights to and from the Pentagon, a former senior Army official told Blaze News.
Casey Wardynski, former assistant secretary of the Army for manpower and Reserve affairs, said gold-top VIP flights operated by the Army 12th Aviation Battalion are a normal part of traffic in the busy but highly controlled air corridor surrounding Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport near Washington, D.C.
“These are going to be some of the most experienced and senior pilots in the Army,” Wardynski said, “because they’re flying secretary of defense, secretary of the Army, chief of staff of the Army, chairman of the Joint Chiefs, these kind of folks around to various locations in the vicinity of Washington helicopter range. And they're going to be doing it day and night.”
The air corridor is 'very highly controlled.'
A U.S. Army VH-60M Black Hawk helicopter on a training exercise collided with a civilian regional airline jet inbound from Kansas late Jan. 29, erupting in a fireball and sending both aircraft into the Potomac River. Sixty-seven people were killed, including three Army soldiers, 60 airline passengers, and four airline crew members. There were no survivors.
American Eagle Flight 5342 left Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport in Wichita at 5:18 p.m. CT and was scheduled to land at Reagan National at 8:57 p.m. ET. The aircraft was a Bombardier CRJ700 regional jet operated by PSA Airlines flying as American Eagle, American CEO Robert Isom said.
Wardynski said this type of military brass shuttle service using Black Hawk helicopters is common.
“It’s not unusual for them to be flying in and out of the Pentagon at night, dropping off VIPs,” Wardynski said.
The Army has only a few true gold-top Black Hawks, he said.
“There aren’t many. They’re for the chief of staff in the Army, secretary of the Army,” Wardynski said. “I flew on a lot of the regular Black Hawk flights in that battalion, probably 20 or 30. But that helicopter is pretty much to Black Hawks what the president’s limo is to Cadillacs. It’s pretty tricked out.”
Some training missions, such as for continuity of government, are always carried out at night, Wardynski said.
'This is an airfield unlike any other in the United States.'
“If they're practicing for a contingency mission, which the one that was in question here was what’s called continuity of government, which essentially means moving key people out of the Pentagon to alternative national military command sites because some serious things are happening in the United States,” he said. “They have to do that at night.”
The gold-tops fly under a “PAT” call sign, which stands for priority air transport, he said. “So when they’re on the FAA radars, it’s going to show ‘PAT’ as their private call sign. And if you're in Washington, you see a lot of PAT flights,” Wardynski said.
The air corridor is “very highly controlled,” said Wardynski, who said he has been a passenger on gold-top Black Hawks operating along the Potomac River.
“Since 9/11, Washington, D.C., has been under integrated air defense by the U.S. Army and some Air Force assets,” Wardynski said. “So you don't stray off course.
“You fly up the river or you fly down the river, and you come into Reagan either from the north or from the south, and you don’t deviate,” he said. “And if you do, you’re on air defense radars and people are going to get excited fast.”
Reagan National Airport is unusual for the heavy level of commercial air traffic, the restricted airspace, and a lot of helicopters, he said.
“This is an airfield unlike any other in the United States in terms of the amount of control exercised by FAA and to some degree the military,” Wardynski said. “The amount of helicopter traffic is extremely unusual, because you’ve got the Park Police, the National Guard, Pentagon people, and of course Metropolitan Police flying all over there.”
Wardynski said a proficiency training flight would practice “for some sort of wartime environment in which D.C. might be blacked out. The airport’s blacked out; there are no aircraft in the air.”
The Black Hawks do not have collision avoidance systems like commercial aircraft, Wardynski said. Although even those systems are unpredictable at low altitudes, he added.
If the helicopter pilot and crew were training with night-vision gear, that can complicate the flight due to light sensitivity and depth-of-field issues, he continued.
“The light really flares, and that can be disorienting, but that's why you practice,” Wardynski said. “It’s just maybe practicing right next to one of the busiest and most complex airports in America would be something you don’t want to do any more.”
A former U.S. Army special operator with years of experience on Black Hawk missions flown in and out of Fort Belvoir, said issues with the regional jet, the Black Hawk, and air traffic control could have played significant roles in the crash.
“Because the airline pilot had the right of way and was on final descent below 500 feet, [the airline crew] were not performing ‘heads-up checks,’” he told Blaze News. “They also had precision ground approach radar, which should have warned them of another craft in such close proximity.”
The source said the helicopter crew’s possible use of night-vision gear in this environment would be “incomprehensible, because of the restricted peripheral vision.”
Air traffic control, he said, “carries the ultimate responsibility because he allowed both aircraft to be operating at the same altitude while in such close proximity.”
A Blaze News source with air traffic control experience said he questions the decision of an experienced Army flight crew conducting a continuity-of-government exercise at a time of night with so much air traffic congestion.
“If they felt it necessary for such an exercise, they should have come back after 11 p.m., when flights in and out of Reagan have ceased,” he said.
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'Don't forget me here' says Afghan interpreter who once helped Biden after an emergency helicopter landing in Afghanistan
An Afghan interpreter who was involved in a 2008 rescue effort after a helicopter carrying then-Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.) and two other lawmakers made an emergency landing amid a snowstorm is now stranded in Afghanistan following the U.S. pullout, according to the Wall Street Journal.
"Hello Mr. President: Save me and my family," Mohammed, who requested not to use his full name while in hiding, told the outlet on Monday. "Don't forget me here."
The man, his wife, and his children are currently hiding from the Taliban, according to the outlet. They are some of the Afghan allies still stuck in Afghanistan after the U.S. completed its withdrawal from that country on Monday. Some U.S. citizens are also stranded in Afghanistan.
White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was asked on Tuesday about her response to this man and about why he and other Afghan allies remain in Afghanistan if President Biden believes, as he said on Tuesday, that the mass evacuation was an "extraordinary success."
During her response Psaki said that "our efforts and our focus right now ... is to the diplomatic phase. We will get you out. We will honor your service."
Here is more from the Journal's report:
Mohammed was a 36-year-old interpreter for the U.S. Army in 2008 when two U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopters made an emergency landing in Afghanistan during a blinding snowstorm, according to Army veterans who worked with him at the time. On board were three U.S. senators: Mr. Biden, the Delaware Democrat, John Kerry, (D., Mass.) and Chuck Hagel, (R., Neb.).
As a private security team with the former firm Blackwater and U.S. Army soldiers monitored for any nearby Taliban fighters, the crew sent out an urgent call for help. At Bagram Air Field, Mohammed jumped in a Humvee with a Quick Reaction Force from the Arizona National Guard working with the 82nd Airborne Division and drove hours into the nearby mountains to rescue them, said Brian Genthe, then serving as a staff sergeant in the Arizona National Guard who brought Mohammed along on the rescue mission.
The outlet noted that "Mohammed joined the Army Humvees and three Blackwater SUVs as they barreled through thick snow to find the helicopters." The lawmakers were transported back to the American base, according to Matthew Springmeyer, who was heading the Blackwater security in the choppers that day, according to the outlet.
Mohammed kept guard with Afghan soldiers on one side of the aircraft as members of the 82nd Airborne guarded the other side, Genthe noted, according to the outlet. Mohammed remained for 30 hours until the American military could get the choppers airborne again and the troops back to Bagram.
The man was so highly trusted that troops would sometimes provide him with a weapon to utilize if they encountered trouble when they ventured into tough places, Genthe said, according to the outlet.
"His selfless service to our military men and women is just the kind of service I wish more Americans displayed," Lt. Col. Andrew R. Till wrote earlier this year in order in support of Mohammed's application for a Special Immigrant Visa, according to the Journal.
The outlet reported: "Mohammed's visa application became stuck after the defense contractor he worked for lost the records he needed for his application, Mr. Genthe said. Then the Taliban seized Kabul on Aug. 15. Like thousands of others, Mohammed said he tried his luck by going to the Kabul airport gates, where he was rebuffed by U.S. forces. Mohammed could get in, they told him, but not his wife or their children."
"I can't leave my house," Mohammad said on Tuesday. "I'm very scared."
President Biden has been facing criticism for abandoning Afghan allies and U.S. citizens who are still in Afghanistan following the U.S. pullout.
In a statement on Monday he said that he "asked the Secretary of State to lead the continued coordination with our international partners to ensure safe passage for any Americans, Afghan partners, and foreign nationals who want to leave Afghanistan."
"The bottom line: 90% of Americans in Afghanistan who wanted to leave were able to leave," he said during a speech on Tuesday. "And for those remaining Americans, there is no deadline. We remain committed to getting them out if they want to come out."
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