PSA CRJ-700 AA midair collision

IIRC from my aviation studydays, TCAS wasn't implemented as a regulation/requirement until 1981 - PSA 182 was in 1978.

Air Florida 90 was four years later -- deicing standards weren't really heavily improved until afterward. Again, written in blood.

Quick edit-
I only mean the importance and training from the ramp side of the industry as deicers of holdover times, application, ... Really, and the elements of trust being put into the applications.
 
BEEF SUPREME said:
But really is it that big of a deal to make the helicopters just stay the F out of a busy class B? It saves a few minutes?

I don't get it.
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There are things helos have to do inside Class B just like airplanes have to. Have to share the airspace and keep heads up.
 
I haven't read the entire thread, but it appears that on Helicopter Route 4, the Helo should have been on the eastern shore of the Potomac. Not closer to the approach end of 33.
 

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Old Boeing Driver said:
I haven't read the entire thread, but it appears that on Helicopter Route 4, the Helo should have been on the eastern shore of the Potomac. Not closer to the approach end of 33.
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On the animations, they start off following the East bank but immediately before the collision deviate right into the middle of the river, for what reason we don’t know. A lot of speculation that they visually ID’d the wrong aircraft.
 
Old Boeing Driver said:
I haven't read the entire thread, but it appears that on Helicopter Route 4, the Helo should have been on the eastern shore of the Potomac. Not closer to the approach end of 33.
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Even if they were exactly at 200 and over the edge of the shore it would have been extremely close. I just measured and its about 3000 feet from the end of the runway to the edge of the shore. At 3000 thats a little more than the length of a typical MALSR approach lighting system. No way anyone was intending for a CRJ to pass overhead a 100 or so feet over the top of a blackhawk. If that was the intent they really miscalculated. I am in the camp of visually IDd the wrong aircraft (Imagine if one pilot says "got em and pointed to his right or in the distance how easy would it be for the other pilot to not even look in the other direction), or misjudged closure rate and direction.
 
Roger Roger said:
Doesn’t really matter. If the Blackhawk calls traffic in sight, unless some other evidence comes up, this seems to be on them.
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Absolutely, and maybe this is better suited for the discussion on the other thread, but if this investigation can both show that ATC wasn't to blame, but that ATC resource shortages were a contributing factor, I think that's the best outcome we could get.
 
Roger Roger said:
And if the FAA were an actual safety agency, they would have been throttling traffic to what their staffing would handle. But that would make it hard for airlines to hit their profitability targets so…
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There was a lot of 'immediate' in that recording, which has always struck me as a sign that things are, how you say, down the •ter at that position.
 
Murdoughnut said:
NY Times is citing an internal FAA report saying the controller in question was "doing a job normally done by two people."
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My guess is DCA tower has a dedicated class B advisory position like EWR/LGA/JFK have to talk to VFR’s in the corridors. It was combined up with local in this case because there wasn’t enough river traffic and/or staffing to justify opening it.
 
The issue for me is the helo requesting visual separation. You don’t request it, you maintain it. Was he expecting vectors away or was it a difference in phraseology?
 
MikeD said:
Getting patients to/from hospitals, patrol work, transport work, etc. Helos and fixed wing have coexisted for a very long time in Class B. Accidents like this are very rare events, and I’m sure this one will come with some operational changes on routes and altitudes in certain segments of routes, in the DCA area.
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Agree, a blanket ban is excessive, but I think that in retrospect we’ll look at certain routes and procedures as having been an accident waiting to happen. One also has to wonder, given that this was from a VIP unit, what the cost/benefit is of many of these helo missions. Similar to low-acuity HEMS transfers. Maybe a good thing for DOGE to look at…
 
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