The crew of the Army Black Hawk helicopter that collided with an American Airlines jet near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport last month may not have heard a key air traffic control instruction before the crash, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said on Feb. 14.
The helicopter crew did not hear air traffic control’s (ATC) communication to “pass behind” the CRJ-700 jet moments before the collision, according to the aircraft’s cockpit voice recorder data.
The agency also said it was confident that the helicopter’s radio altitude at the time of the collision was 278 feet, higher than its 200-feet maximum altitude for that route.
Additionally, the helicopter’s crew was likely wearing night vision goggles at the time of the crash, the NTSB added.
“We believe the helicopter crew was likely wearing night vision goggles throughout the flight, given the nature of the flight,” NTSB chair Jennifer Homendy said at a news briefing on Feb. 14.
Homendy said the crew was performing a combined annual and night vision goggle check ride.
“Additionally, had they been removed, the crew was required to have a discussion about going unaided. There is no evidence on the cockpit voice recorder, or CVR, of such a discussion on this chart.”
Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth had said a day after the crash that the crew was likely wearing night-vision goggles at some point during the flight.
The plane’s landing lights, along with Washington’s vast city lights on the ground below, could be “blinding,” one pilot said, potentially being a “tremendous contributing factor” to the crash, the other pilot said.
The NTSB also said the helicopter was likely above its maximum allowed altitude for that route.
“Now we’re confident with the radio altitude of the Black Hawk at the time of the collision, that was 278 feet. But I want to caution that does not mean that’s what the Black Hawk crew was seeing on the barometric altimeters in the cockpit,” Homendy said.
“We are seeing conflicting information in the data, which is why we aren’t releasing altitude for the Black Hawk’s entire route.”
Minutes before the crash, the pilot flying the helicopter indicated an altitude of 300 feet, while the instructor pilot said they were at 400 feet.
“Neither pilot made a comment discussing an altitude discrepancy at this time,” Homendy said.
At that point, the helicopter began descending to the maximum of 200 feet for that route at the behest of the instructor pilot. Later on, she said it was possible the pilots were seeing conflicting altitude data from inside the cockpit.
However, just two minutes before the collision, air traffic control transmitted that the CRJ jet was at 1,200 feet and circling to runway 33, yet the helicopter’s cockpit voice recorder did not pick up the communication.
“We hear the word circling in ATC communications, but we do not hear the word circling on the CVR of the Black Hawk,” Homendy continued. “The recorders group is evaluating this right now.”
Seventeen seconds before impact, air traffic control told the helicopter crew to “pass behind” the CRJ jet, but the pilots also did not receive that communication, she added.
“CVR data from the Black Hawk indicated that the portion of the transmission that stated ‘pass behind the’ may not have been received by the Black Hawk crew,” Homendy said.
“Transmission was stepped on by a 0.8-second mic key from the Black Hawk. The Black Hawk was keying the mic to communicate with ATC” when it indicated it could see traffic ahead and requested visual separation from the airport’s control tower, which the tower granted.
With that portion of the transmission lost, the instructor pilot told the pilot flying the helicopter to “move left toward the east bank of the Potomac” instead of passing behind the CRJ jet.
Homendy said the NTSB did not find any evidence in the helicopter’s cockpit voice recorder indicating that its crew saw or knew of the impending collision before impact.
