American Airlines CRJ700 collides with UH-60 Black Hawk and crashes into the Potomac River

This is the most authoritative and explanatory explanation you're going to find right now.


View: https://youtu.be/RzQe6W7vcu4
It's pretty clear the UH-60 crew was not looking at the right airplane.

When I flew in NavAir in the '60s, we'd fly more in three months than military aviators do today in a year ... might relate to DC mid-air!

However, IMHO the BIG cause that I don't see anyone among all the "experts" mentioning is the outdated 'noise abatement' regs that funnel all traffic in and out of DCA into narrow sewer pipe up and down the Potomac. Now EVERY military, police, park authority and medevac group has helos squeezing into this overloaded channel. The H-60 should have been thousands of yards East over the defunct Bolling/Anacostia air stations and sewage treatment plant.

When aircraft noise regs were instituted, we had raucous prop planes with long, slow climb outs ... today's jets are 1/3 as noisy. Plus, where the area around DCA in Alexandria, Arlington and Georgetown was filled with low rent, poorly insulated apartments/worker homes, built before air conditioning. Since then, high value real estate has filled the corridors with well-sealed mega-bux homes, that no one venture outside of.

But, no one has the balls to fight three states, 10 counties and 24 municipalities in DC metro that ALL have to agree for any changes.

Can only hope the new FAA and DoT heads realize this and bring the hammer down on the status quo.

While I somewhat agree to the first part of your post because it is true and 707 and DC-8 aircraft produced over 120 decibels and every ten db is a doubling so around 16 times the noise of modern jets I think the chance of the new heads of FAA and DOT being proactive is zero

I doubt they will be able to even think of this when they are being stripped of all their corporate knowledge and stripped of funds while still trying to maintain safety with no staff and no money.

MiTasol said:

While I somewhat agree to the first part of your post because it is true and 707 and DC-8 aircraft produced over 120 decibels and every ten db is a doubling so around 16 times the noise of modern jets I think the chance of the new heads of FAA and DOT being proactive is zero

I doubt they able to even think of this when they are being stripped of all their corporate knowledge and stripped of funds while still trying to maintain safety with no staff and no money.

Click to expand...

Prop planes not only had a higher db level, but the low frequency of the recip club props had a more objectional, lower frequency noise pattern.

I flunked soothsaying, and there seems to be a lot of nay-saying from the louder elements of society ... basically, I feel this incident could provide an opportunity to push through a long-needed solution in an awkward political region. I lived in the DC area during Beltway, Metro and I66 construction, and felt that solving the mid East issues were easy by comparison.

I have never seen noise levels for the large piston liners but would add to your comment that the big pistons stuck around much longer because of their slower speeds and slower climb rates.

When I worked at Chino in the early 70's the EC-121's operating from Ontario Airport were hellishly noisy and had a climb rate that "depended on the curvature of the earth" so when the wind was wrong they flew near to my home. I love piston aircraft but I made an exception for those EC-121s.

I find it odd that no NTSB briefings or media reports that I've seen address the reason for the late change of runways for the airliner. I suspect that it was due to some problem in controlling ground traffic ... three runways in tight real estate leaves little room for taxiways or holding areas, and go-arounds really scramble things ... it's an honest to God 3-dimensional chess game with dozens of players at one time.

However, my basic concern is a planned/authorized of only 200' separation for converging traffic is absurd, especially with all that open area just to the East for a helo corridor, separate from the DCA corridors up and down the Potomac. That's airshow/Blue Angel type planning and clearance being done every day, bad weather and at night!

Off the top of my head, I can count 11 military/govt. facilities in the immediate area with regular helo operations, including White House, VP residence/Observatory Circle, CIA, DIA, Forts Myer, McNair, & Belvoir, Marine Barracks, Pentagon, Navy Yard, CG unit and the Marine VIP helos (HMX-1) at Anacostia/Bolling right across the river from DCA. There are also medevac, police and park helos. To me it's ridiculous why they don't run helos up and down I295, parallel to the Potomac, a full Km to the East. Compare this to wherever you are ... I have not lived in any other urban area without frequent police and military helos with little restrictive corridors, and I've lived dozens of places since '60s.



DC is the heartland of political NIMBY movements: fighting building of the Beltway, I66 through Arlington, widening the Beltway bridges, keeping the Metro out of toney Georgetown (would bring in wrong element!), even prohibiting kite flying in DC parks while destructive and noisy protests are just fine. With three states, 9 counties and 17 communities enjoying just saying "NO"!

World Peace is easier to enable than any new DC area noise abatement changes.

You are talking a sort of logic in US home of creating mind numbingly confusing regulation (and your US legislation is plain English and logical compared to Australia where the tax dept put out a 144 page booklet on how to fill in a two page tax form - and NO that booklet was not multilingual - it was English only. AND I can give far worse examples than that one but they take too much space).

In reality the reply will be some thing like this way if the helicopter engine fails it falls in the river but if they follow the highway they will fall on cars and that might be my car so I will not vote for it.

Or one accident every 20 years is acceptable

They will only change it when a politician dies in the helicopter or aircraft, ordinary people and service members are expendable.

The National Transportation and Safety Board has concluded that the separation distances allowed between helicopter and airplane traffic on the route where an Army helicopter and a commercial passenger jet collided midair on Jan. 29 near Washington "pose an intolerable risk to aviation safety," according to its preliminary investigation report released Tuesday.

As a result, the NTSB is recommending helicopter flights be immediately prohibited on "Route 4″ — where the fatal crash occurred — between Hains Point and the Wilson Bridge along the Potomac River when planes are landing or taking off on runways 15 and 33 at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA).

The board is also recommending an alternative helicopter route between Hains Point and the Wilson Bridge when that segment of Route 4 is not open to rotary-wing traffic.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wid_Q9h139A

There's a lot of good information in GTX's posted video discussion, and the NYTimes article seems to have jumped to a conclusion fitting one of their agendas, ignoring facts and reason ... no surprise in this "It's more important to be First than be Right" media environment.

But ... these clickbait jocks obfuscate any message by dragging out their back slapping and cute comments filled with made to impress inside jargon and acronyms. They're in the business of getting you to open their video, and run it as long as possible. They could have made their point in a fraction of the time!

If you look back in this thread, you'll see I've flown in and out of DCA since the '60s, but last piloted there in the '80s. But note that I observed that all traffic was routed up and down the Potomac, ONLY FOR OUTDATED NOISE ABATEMENT ISSUES, AND WITH THE MULTIPLE POLITICAL ENTITIES IN THE AREA, THEY'VE AVOIDED CHANGE ... EVEN AS AIR TRAFFIC HAS MAGNIFIED!

I'm not seeking "I told you so" but I noted that there's a large I295 freeway 1/4 mi. East, parallel to the River that would have been a safe and noise neutral helo path.

I'm glad that the NTSB agrees with the I295 helo corridor (it's that obvious!) and hope the flummoxed Metropolitan Washington Council of Governments (COG) or whomever can expedite their blessing to make this situation go away ... it's existed for near 80 years!!

Two updates this last week. I saw both on my phone and I cannot find the original articles but I will link to two on AP and comment on those.


The Army knew their altimeters were inaccurate and did nothing to address the problem. This clearly indicates that their safety management is appalling. Their preferred fix is to replace the old Blackhawks with new ones. I learned to fly from an uncontrolled airport and have flown from uncontrolled airports many times since. SOP is to set the barometric scale on the altimeter to the actual airport elevation immediately before take off. That simple change to the modern Army SOP for all older Blackhawk's would have prevented this accident. Equally, if they had an operative Safety Management System, knowing that altitude is critical on that route, they should have sent the old Blackhawks somewhere where this could not cause a problem and replaced them with ones that had accurate altimeters. They did nothing so are now in full CYA mode and saying it is all the FAA's fault.


According to https://edition.cnn.com/2025/08/01/us/ntsb-final-day-collision-hearing the FAA went straight into CYA mode as well and blames the Army for the accident. Worse still they tampered with the evidence if this statement is correct. Even worse this appears to be the default mode for FAA in investigations, again if this quote is correct.

There is a discussion on the whole three days at

View: https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/1me3vz0/anybody_watching_the_live_broadcast_of_the_ntsb/
I found this statement most concerning.