Anonymous wrote:Why hasn’t the identity of the third helicopter pilot been revealed?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is it odd that we still don’t know the identity of the third helicopter passenger?

It's actually one of the pilots we don't know. We know the instructor pilot and the crew chief (back passenger.) He was the one with the wife and one year old son.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This administration will be slow to blame the helicopter pilot, cuz military, and also he was a white male.

But I don’t envision a scenario where the Black Hawk crew was not at fault.

One scenario is if everyone on the BH was following normal procedure for these flights, if they were doing the same things that most military helicopters do when they go through that corridor.

With these reports coming out of the large volume of "near misses" at National involving helicopters, it raises the question of whether these flights have been unsafe for years and a mid-air collision was an inevitability because of systemic problems.

Like we're all sitting around trying to understand why the helicopter was flying above 200 ft, why they assured ATC twice that they had visual separation but apparently never checked their radar, why the helicopter shifted to the middle of the river when the prescribed flight pattern expects helicopters to hug the eastern short (specifically to stay out of the way of aircraft taking off and landing at National), and so on.

An investigation could find that the helicopter crew was violating official policy in all of these choice BUT could also find that these behaviors are so typical for helicopters flying that route that the crew could not be considered individually responsible. In that case it's a systemic issue that should have been addressed by people further up the food chain.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have a question about the helicopter pilots and the "visual separation" issue that I have not seen answered on any of the (otherwise incredibly helpful) explainer videos by aviation experts.

I understand why the helicopter pilots may have identified the wrong plane visually due to the angle of the aircraft (the challenge of seeing a plane coming right at you at night in a populated area) and the possible use of night vision goggles.

But would the helicopter not have radar and be able to see that there was a plane on the radar MUCH CLOSER than the plane they may have incorrectly thought ATC was referring to?

I am confused because I would assume with three people on board, one person would be at least glancing at radar periodically (especially while passing National for obvious reasons) and could have easily checked to see where the plane they assured ATC they were maintaining "visual separation" on (twice) was indeed where they thought it was.

I am not a pilot or aviation expert at all so maybe this question is stupid but it's been bothering me. If anyone can explain or point me to a resource that will explain, I would really appreciate it. Thanks.

There are countries that use instrumentation for approaches v visual approaches. Most US airports allow for visual approaches. The prob is sometimes you can't see everything with only your line of sight. There are aviation experts who will bring up the fact that in Europe, pilots will less likely do visual approaches because tech is after process.

I am of the mind that in this tragedy, does it really matter who didn't see whom? Cause obviously someone didn't see a crash happening and it's a tragedy for all. Who is to blame? Who cares. It was 2 aircraft involved you know? We may never know.

I don't know that an in depth investigation will resolve much because in this context, 2 planes crashed that simply did not see each other. Perhaps the answer is simple - and so simple people don't want to believe it: don't rely only on visual approaches in busy congested air traffic at night too often???

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Trump is belligerent even with the easiest questions:

“Trump said he would meet with some of the families affected by the crash. Asked by reporters whether he would visit the collision site, Trump responded: “What’s the site? The water? You want me to go swimming? I don’t have a plan to do that, but I will be meeting with some people that were very badly hurt — with their family member, obviously.””

—WaPo

Can’t believe someone was dumb enough to actually ask him to visit the collision site. He should’ve said oh You mean in the middle of the sky?

These are softball questions. Obviously the reporter meant the site of the recovery efforts. the "collision site" can encompass the entire area, not simply the point in space where the aircraft collided.

But more to the point, this is an opportunity for him to praise the first responders, explain the importance of the effort to recover information that will help us find out what happened and how to prevent it from happening again, and once again express condolences to the families. In other words, an easy opportunity to look/be presidential.

But he's a nasty POS with a personality disorder, so instead he's unnecessarily combative.

+1. So exhausting.

I hate Giuliani but look at how great he did after 9/11 with seeming like a caring human being. The fact that a politician who was elected oresdent can’t at least fake this is truly shocking.

Yup. It’s extremely easy to do the right thing here. It takes work to fvk this up.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This administration will be slow to blame the helicopter pilot, cuz military, and also he was a white male.

But I don’t envision a scenario where the Black Hawk crew was not at fault.

One scenario is if everyone on the BH was following normal procedure for these flights, if they were doing the same things that most military helicopters do when they go through that corridor.

With these reports coming out of the large volume of "near misses" at National involving helicopters, it raises the question of whether these flights have been unsafe for years and a mid-air collision was an inevitability because of systemic problems.

Like we're all sitting around trying to understand why the helicopter was flying above 200 ft, why they assured ATC twice that they had visual separation but apparently never checked their radar, why the helicopter shifted to the middle of the river when the prescribed flight pattern expects helicopters to hug the eastern short (specifically to stay out of the way of aircraft taking off and landing at National), and so on.

An investigation could find that the helicopter crew was violating official policy in all of these choice BUT could also find that these behaviors are so typical for helicopters flying that route that the crew could not be considered individually responsible. In that case it's a systemic issue that should have been addressed by people further up the food chain.

Anonymous wrote:This administration will be slow to blame the helicopter pilot, cuz military, and also he was a white male.

But I don’t envision a scenario where the Black Hawk crew was not at fault.

Anonymous wrote:Why do you need night goggles when it’s already… Night?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why were they flowing 200 feet above the maxixmum altitude. And on top of that not seeing a plane that is descending right in front of them. Seems the helicopter did so many things wrong. Doesn’t really make sense.

One question my spouse and I were just discussing is that we should find out how often helicopters flying that route along the Potomac violate the 200 ft limit for that route.

Meaning: was this helicopter doing something very out of the ordinary OR was it engaging in typical behavior (even if not prescribed behavior for helicopters on that route), and enough other stuff went on that the mistake was fatal.

I wonder if all the things that "went wrong" in this situation actually go wrong all the time, and it's just that they all went wrong at once. Which is scary because that seems like an inevitability.

Good point. I still think it’s crazy to think all the factors had to line up just right for the two to crash. The plane banking to go to the new runway for landing, the Blackhawk flying higher than allowed, and then just the sheer 3D geometry of it. What are the chances they actually crash into each other instead of them having a near miss?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This administration will be slow to blame the helicopter pilot, cuz military, and also he was a white male.

But I don’t envision a scenario where the Black Hawk crew was not at fault.

No one here is disclosing the name of the reservist who was flying the helicopter. Most responsible for altitude and path. Maybe on Friday or Saturday.