DC plane crash has striking similarities to a 1949 tragedy
A passenger plane near Washington, D.C. An unexpected military aircraft. And a fatal mid-air collision.
Wednesday's deadly collision between an American Airlines flight and an Army Black Hawk helicopter at Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) shares striking similarities to a crash that happened in the same airspace on Nov. 1, 1949.
In that crash, a military Lockheed P-38 Lightning having engine trouble slammed into an Eastern Air Lines Douglas DC-4, according to the Arlington Historical Society. Fifty-five people died in the crash, all of them from Eastern Air Lines Flight 537.
At the time it was the deadliest airliner incident in American history, the historical society said. Wednesday's crash killed 67 people, 64 aboard the American Air Lines flight and three aboard the Black Hawk. In that crash, experts said the American flight was on final approach to land at DCA when it collided with the low-flying helicopter on a "proficiency training flight" when it crashed, according to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth.
In the 1949 crash, the pilot of the P-38 was with the Bolivian Air Force and was testing out the plane as part of a sale from the United States to Bolivia.
"Glen Tigner, 21, an air traffic controller on duty at the National Airport Tower on Nov. 1, 1949, sounded the crash alarm," the historical society says in describing the crash. "'Turn left! Turn left!' Tigner had radioed moments earlier as a Bolivian Air Force fighter on a practice run veered toward a commercial flight on approach to the airport from the south."
News reports at the time captured the grim recovery of bodies from the Potomac, victims still strapped to their seats. Flight 53 had taken off from Boston, stopped in New York City, and was headed south to New Orleans.
According to a 2005 Arlington Fire Journal report, retired firefighter Frank Higgins recalled finding body parts amidst the debris, which landed in waist-deep mud. The P-38 pilot was recovered, injured, by a rescue boat launched from Bollin Air Force Base, the Journal reported.
The Bolivian ambassador later told reporters the pilot hadn't heard Tigner's warnings because he was managing engine problems aboard the single-seat turbocharged twin-engine fighter, the Journal reported.
There have been other crashes near DCA as well: On Jan. 13, 1982, Air Florida Flight 90 crashed into the 14th Street Bridge and sank in the river shortly after takeoff, killing more than 80 people. In that case, authorities blamed a winter storm for lowering visibility and causing ice to accumulate on the 737's wings, hampering its ability to climb.
Contributing: Cybele Mayes-Osterman
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