05-02-2025
Last pieces of doomed jet being removed from Potomac River: Updates
Last pieces of doomed jet being removed from Potomac River: Updates
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DC plane crash debris recovered from Potomac River
Authorities have begun to pull the aircrafts out of the Potomac River from the plane crash that killed 67 in D.C.
ARLINGTON, Va. − Crews were working to complete the removal of wreckage of a commercial jet and military helicopter from the Potomac River on Wednesday, one week after the horrifying midair crash that killed all 67 people aboard the two aircrafts.
The National Transportation Safety Board officials said in a Tuesday afternoon update that all the bodies had been recovered from the river, along with much of the Bombardier CRJ700 plane. The rest of the plane and the UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter will be extracted and brought to Hangar 7 at nearby Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport for examination as part of the probe into the collision.
The air traffic control tower display showed the Black Hawk was flying at about 300 feet at the time of the collision, the NTSB said. That would exceed the 200-foot maximum altitude assigned to the flight path.
The Federal Aviation Administration has restricted helicopter flights around the airport and shut down Runway 33, the runway American Eagle Flight 5342 was approaching for its landing when the collision took place on Jan. 29.
Remembering the victims: Students, Olympic skaters, families and more. A tribute to lives lost.
The primary approaches to the airport's main runway provide jets with hundreds of feet of clearance over the helicopter corridors, but Runway 33 is not as accessible, the Washington Post reported. The approach to Runway 33 can take jets within 15 feet of the top of the Route 4 helicopter corridor that the Black Hawk was using, the Post said, citing FAA documents.
The helicopter route and landing path for the runway almost put aircraft 'in the same place,' Scott Dunham, who has worked as a National Transportation Safety Board investigator and an air traffic control instructor, told the Post. 'You have to move one of them.'
DC plane crash updates: Officials recover all 67 people killed in devastating collision
Collision renews urgent questions: Near collisions, air safety issues under scrutiny
There have been several near collisions and other close calls around the country in recent years that concerned experts and officials. Robert W. Mann Jr., a former airline executive officer and current president of R. W. Mann and Co. consulting, told USA TODAY that the growth in air travel demands have put more planes and helicopters are in the sky.
"It creates a more congested and more complex control environment, especially near major hubs but also en route, and that just creates greater challenges,' Mann said. 'The complexity of traffic and the density of traffic in terminal areas of large airports – that's what's driving an increasing number of incursions, runway incursions, taxiways incursions, incidents of aircraft damage on the ground, and in some cases, real tragedies.' Read more here.
− Zach Wichter and Nathan Diller
Friends remember Brian Ellis: DC plane crash passenger 'one of the best'
Brian Ellis and his teammates won the Georgia state high school football championship in 1987. By the fall of his senior year in 1988, he was their starting quarterback.
'It was an early sign of his leadership and commitment to team values,' stated a tribute to him this week by the public school district in his hometown in Clayton County, Georgia. Those virtues would follow him through a football career at the U.S. Naval Academy, almost 22 years as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps, and in the enduring friendships he maintained until he perished with 66 others in the crash over Washington, D.C., last week.
Ellis, 53, served as a helicopter pilot and instructor for 12 years of his Marine career, including stints overseas while deployed. For his friends, the irony of his death in a collision with an Army helicopter was tough to handle. Read more here.
− Dinah Voyles Pulver
