An email to Alex Berenson said:
The accident appears to be a classic CRM “swiss cheese” multiple failure event, as are most aircraft accidents.
Any one of the following interventions could have prevented this accident:
-More timely, accurate and positive confirmation of traffic by an overtasked ATC [air-traffic control] controller.
-Adequate staffing in ATC tower.
-Black Hawk copilot/evaluator/instructor taking command of the aircraft or issuing timely instructions to correct altitude deviation.
-Observation/safety observer pilot aboard who is not wearing NVGs.
-Not doing military training missions in busy airport approach corridor when a much safer less congested one is available to the south of DCA
-Use of collusion avoidance technology by the Black Hawk. Airliners have this and can visualize on screen potential threats, although this is low altitude inhibited.
-and most importantly, adherence to published altitudes.
-If the American commuter pilots had not accepted the side-step on the Mount Vernon Visual Approach from RW1 to RW 33 there would be no collision.
-If a single pilot was not wearing NVGs, the plane might have been visible.
-If the helo was on altitude, they may have been able to discern the aircraft lights unobscured in the night sky looking up rather than looking level into lights on the west shoreline
From the limited info available I am able to draw a few conclusions.
1. The helo was flying higher than the max permitted 200′. Had they adhered to this altitude restriction the accident would not have happened.
2. The ATC controller apparently did not provide timely, accurate, complete advise to the helo of the commercial airline traffic on approach to DCA.
3. The ATC controller apparently was task-saturated, performing dual roles, perhaps at the end of a long shift when attentiveness wanes.
4. The American jet may have been belly up to the helo in the final part of his turn or in subsequent corrections to centerline due to #5.
5. Strong, gusty crosswinds winds of 25 knots may have necessitated to a steep turn of the American jet to prevent overshoot of centerline and also affected helo altitude control.
6. NVG use by both pilots may have rendered the American jet invisible due to oversaturation of background lighting emanating from the west side of the Potomac.
7. The helo exhibited an erratic flight path, executing two near 90 degree turns, turning west off course, crossing Haines Point and heading directly to the north end of DCA airport before turning back south along the river. Given the airspace, this is indicative of inexperience, unfamiliarity and possibly even incompetence.
8. The inability of the pilot to maintain altitude, especially on a clear night is highly indicative of aircraft unfamiliarity, lack of recent flying, and gross incompetence, likely exacerbated by the unpracticed use of NVGs.
9. Military pilots love to do low level flying, especially in cool places like up the Potomac River by DCA and the Capital at night and take risks.
10. The Warrant Officer instructor pilot may have had a possible hesitancy to correct a (new?) female Captain of unknown qualifications and experience and higher rank.
11. There appears to be zero accountability of the American commuter pilots in the accident. They were exactly where they should have been on the MV 01 approach and sidestep to the RW 33 visual approach.
The DCA Potomac corridor is not one to be used in training new and inexperienced pilots, who are not current and highly experienced with NVGs.
It is my sincere hope that the female pilot flying the helo earned her place in this unit, based on merit, and there are no DEI factors involved. This unit is a highly competitive, desired assignment that has traditionally been awarded to the best of the best for a non-combat tour.
A friend says:
I don’t know whether she deliberately hit the plane. It clearly looks that way from the videos, but it may just be that she was in over her head. I read a further post last night that they should have been another observer in the helicopter on the other side of it because of the difficulty of seeing at night.
It’s also clear that the news media is being deliberately deceptive about her flying experience. Now the news reports have been corrected to say she had 450 hours of flight time. As you point out if you have 500 hours of flight time that is two hours a week for five years. That isn’t a lot, especially in such a heavily trafficked corridor and at night. Its pretty clear that she fucked up flying higher than 200 feet above the ground. It also looks like the ATC was doing too much.
I agree with you that it looks like she was recruited and promoted for political reasons and not necessarily based on her competence, but it is worth considering the following:
A large percentage of women who enlist in the military (all branches) are lesbians.
DEI “quotas” mean that they get promoted disproportionately.
It is no surprise that a progressive administration would look to someone like her to provide window dressing and proof that their progressive policies when imposed on the military do not harm it.
