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Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

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Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#71

Post by sigmar »

Jtsummers wrote: post #31
ghc wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In addition, the White House has put a hiring freeze in place, prohibiting the replacement of open government positions or the creation of new ones while the administration evaluates reductions in the workforce. The White House plans to release a memorandum with further guidance within 90 days. This has drawn criticism from lawmakers as the FAA has been ramping up controller hiring. https://www.ainonline.com/aviati…

In fairness to the current administration, while the hiring freeze may have impacted ATC hiring, that is not causal here. No one hired last week would have been running things today (if they were hit with the freeze).

Someone that was hired weeks or months ago, but scheduled to start last week, could* have been included in the hiring freeze. There's examples here of rescinded offers after doing irs on-boarding: https://www.journalofaccountancy.com/news/2025/jan/executive... (Not that there's information that suggests this caused the incident)

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#72

Post by LeafItAlone »

bsder wrote: post #69
bryant wrote: post #27

Not that being near DC affords me any kind of right to an opinion, but: Given the uptick in near miss incidents across the US the last few years, this is the kind of incident that should've been entirely avoidable through changes in policy from these past events but is also apparently the only kind that can spur along policy changes. I can see a world where the fault is on the VH-60, but absent more information, it w…

Reagan should have been shut down for commercial use many moons ago. It will never be shut down because it's got all the exceptions so that Congresscritters don't have to be treated the same as us plebians.

>It will never be shut down because it's got all the exceptions so that Congresscritters don't have to be treated the same as us plebians.

DCA is open to the public.

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#73

Post by rayiner »

ghc wrote: post #10
nradov wrote: post #7

Obviously it will take some time for the full accident analysis but there have been quite a few near misses lately due to air traffic controller errors. Flight volume has been growing, airspace near airports is more congested, and controllers are overworked. Eventually all of the "Swiss cheese" holes line up. We're going to need to hire more controllers. Also, it appears that one of the aircraft was a military (not p…

> In addition, the White House has put a hiring freeze in place, prohibiting the replacement of open government positions or the creation of new ones while the administration evaluates reductions in the workforce. The White House plans to release a memorandum with further guidance within 90 days. This has drawn criticism from lawmakers as the FAA has been ramping up controller hiring. https://www.ainonline.com/aviati…

https://www.govexec.com/workforce/2025/01/broad-exemptions-t...

> President Trump signed an executive order instituting the freeze on Monday shortly after his inauguration, but allowed for exceptions for positions related to immigration enforcement, national security or public safety.

Important to read the details! There will be lots of misinformation as people invoke the minority of critical jobs as cover to defend the less critical ones.

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#74

Post by pbronez »

unsnap_biceps wrote: post #59
cryptonector wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://x.com/aletweetsnews/status/1884789306645983319 You see the helo coming from the left on the screen while the airliner appears to be descending. The helo must have gotten in the way (as opposed to catching up from behind). The airliner's lights are unmistakable, so how did the helo pilot not notice them? The airliner's pilots might not have had a chance to notice the helo. Since the helo was crossing an active…

My only thought is that it's a regional jet, so it's smaller than a "normal" commercial flight. At night, if you expect it to be a big jet and it looks small, you presume it's just further away. I think they saw it, saw it small and presumed they had enough time to make it in front of it.

Maybe, but those smaller aircraft handle tons of flights in and out of DCA. Lots of commuter flights to NYC, Boston, etc.

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#75

Post by _yb2s »

bryant wrote: post #27

Not that being near DC affords me any kind of right to an opinion, but: Given the uptick in near miss incidents across the US the last few years, this is the kind of incident that should've been entirely avoidable through changes in policy from these past events but is also apparently the only kind that can spur along policy changes. I can see a world where the fault is on the VH-60, but absent more information, it w…

I have a feeling from your comment that you know more about aviation than you are letting on, and the part about being in DC not giving you a right to an opinion seems pretty silly in that context.

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#76

Post by dralley »

readthenotes1 wrote: post #9
nradov wrote: post #7

Obviously it will take some time for the full accident analysis but there have been quite a few near misses lately due to air traffic controller errors. Flight volume has been growing, airspace near airports is more congested, and controllers are overworked. Eventually all of the "Swiss cheese" holes line up. We're going to need to hire more controllers. Also, it appears that one of the aircraft was a military (not p…

[flagged]

It is so incredibly tiring that you dweebs try to blame every single bad outcome in the world on cough minorities cough "DEI", with zero evidence.

In fact, literally when you posted this comment there were already ATC recordings floating around of the controller telling the helicopter pilot to maintain separation from the exact airliner they crashed into.

Take a look in the mirror.

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#77

Post by bsder »

LeafItAlone wrote: post #72
bsder wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reagan should have been shut down for commercial use many moons ago. It will never be shut down because it's got all the exceptions so that Congresscritters don't have to be treated the same as us plebians.

>It will never be shut down because it's got all the exceptions so that Congresscritters don't have to be treated the same as us plebians. DCA is open to the public.

DCA is open to the public. But it has lots of ways for Congressmen to avoid the inconveniences that you and I have to endure.

The other airports in the area do not have those.

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#78

Post by idlewords »

bryant wrote: post #27

Not that being near DC affords me any kind of right to an opinion, but: Given the uptick in near miss incidents across the US the last few years, this is the kind of incident that should've been entirely avoidable through changes in policy from these past events but is also apparently the only kind that can spur along policy changes. I can see a world where the fault is on the VH-60, but absent more information, it w…

[flagged]

Re: Commercial jet collides with Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan airport

#79

Post by foobarchu »

ekianjo wrote: post #57
ghc wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In addition, the White House has put a hiring freeze in place, prohibiting the replacement of open government positions or the creation of new ones while the administration evaluates reductions in the workforce. The White House plans to release a memorandum with further guidance within 90 days. This has drawn criticism from lawmakers as the FAA has been ramping up controller hiring. https://www.ainonline.com/aviati…

Is there an actual reason why the control tower work can't be fully automated? For train control lights we almost don't rely on human operators anywhere.

Not an expert but I can't imagine that would go very well. Trains have a single axis of movement that sometimes cross or combines with others. Aircraft have three axes of movement all under human control.
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