(Washington) The US government admitted Wednesday that the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the Army played a role in the collision that occurred last January between an airliner and a Black Hawk helicopter near Washington, causing 67 victims.
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This is the deadliest accident on American soil in more than 20 years.
In its official response to the first complaint filed by a family of victims, the government is held responsible, in particular because the air traffic controller violated procedures relating to the maintenance of visual separation by the pilots that evening.
Furthermore, according to the complaint, the “lack of vigilance of the pilots of the army helicopter, which prevented them from seeing and avoiding” the airliner, engages the responsibility of the government.
The complaint, however, suggested that others, including the plane’s pilots and the airlines, may also have played a role. It also involved American Airlines and its regional partner, PSA Airlines, but these companies filed motions to dismiss.
At least 28 bodies were recovered from the icy waters of the Potomac after a helicopter apparently struck the American Airlines regional jet as it landed at Ronald Reagan National Airport in Northern Virginia, just across the river from Washington, D.C., authorities said. The plane was carrying 60 passengers and four crew members. Three soldiers were on board the helicopter.
Robert Clifford, one of the lawyers for the family of victim Casey Crafton, pointed out that the government had admitted “the responsibility of the military for this unnecessary loss of life” and the FAA’s failure to comply with air traffic control procedures, while recognizing “rightly” that other actors, American Airlines and PSA Airlines, had also contributed to the deaths.
The families of the victims “remain deeply saddened and plunged into mourning following this tragic loss of life,” he said.
Government lawyers said in their motion that “the United States acknowledges that it failed in its duty of care to plaintiffs, which directly caused this tragic accident.”
The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) will release its report on the causes of the accident early next year.
However, investigators have already identified several contributing factors, including the fact that the helicopter was flying 80 feet higher than the 200-foot limit on a trajectory that allowed only minimal spacing between planes landing on Reagan Airport’s secondary runway and helicopters passing below.
Additionally, according to the NTSB, the FAA failed to identify hazards around this busy airport, even after 85 near misses in the three years preceding the accident.
Before the collision, the controller asked the helicopter pilots twice if they had the plane in sight. The pilots responded in the affirmative and requested authorization to carry out a visual separation in order to be able to maintain visual distance.
At NTSB investigative hearings, FAA officials acknowledged that controllers at Reagan Airport had relied too heavily on visual separation. The agency has since abandoned this practice.
Witnesses told the NTSB that they had serious questions about the helicopter crew’s ability to spot the plane with night vision goggles, and about the relevance of their aim.
Investigators said the helicopter pilots may not have been aware of their altitude because the barometric altimeter they were relying on indicated an altitude 24 to 30 meters lower than that recorded by the flight data recorder.
Among the victims of the accident were a group of young, high-performance figure skaters, their parents and coaches, who had just participated in a competition in Wichita, Kansas.
