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Posts: 15725
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
DC plane/helicopter crash
We just had that boat crash into the bridge in Baltimore. This plane crash is a lot closer to home for me. The video below explains very clear what is going on around here. I live just south of the National Harbour and cross the bridge into Alexandria every week. Those helicopters training daily have been an issue since I moved there 20 some years ago. They buzz damn close to the Wilson bridge, exactly where the planes fly over head coming from the south. It is scary to drive across that bridge and suddenly a big helicopter is right above your head. I am sure they have caused accidents that distract drivers. But honestly I am surprised that they never crashed into the damn bridge. Further to the east we have the Air Force base where we often see low flying monster transports and F 18 breaking sound barrier etc....I am talking about 7 minute drive east of this Airport collision. But these are almost as distracting to drivers as the helicopters.
This collision was inevitable in my mind. A close friend had 4 hunting buddies on that plane, each were dads.
Posts: 3487
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to Ricardo)
We lived on Bolling AFB within the city limits of Washington DC during 1951-55. One of the girls I dated in high school lived in Fort Washington, MD. Another lived on a couple hundred acres on the Maryland shore of the Potomac across from Mount Vernon--it's now part of Piscataway Park. On the 4th of July we would go out on the river on one of Bolling's 42-foot boats to watch the fireworks on the Mall. So I'm familiar with the area.
In those days there were three sets of active runways in a small area along the Potomac: Bolling, Anacostia Naval Air Station and Washington National. Not as crowded as it is now with only Ronald Reagan Airport (Washington National), but still a busy airspace for the 1950s.
While we ate dinner one evening the phone rang. Dad was called to answer it. He almost never swore in the presence of Mom, my brother or me, but we heard him say as he signed off, "Good, I won't have to kill the son-of-a-bitch myself."
Someone flying a WW II P-38 had collided with a Lockheed Constellation airliner, cutting off the Connie's tail. Bolling had responsibility for crash rescue on the Potomac, so it came under Dad's command.
Shortly after the end of WW II the military sold vast quantities of "war surplus." Among the stuff bought by Dad and "Uncle Bob" Weller, his former partner in the San Antonio Piper aircraft dealership, were dozens of aircraft engines, useful to the airlines, a diesel-electric railroad locomotive, a couple of P-51 fighters, and a couple of P-38s--all dirt cheap at auctions.
They sold one of the P-38s to a rich South American, who gave it to his son for his birthday. The son fancied himself as a hot-shoe pilot. He was flying the P-38 when he chopped the tail off the Constellation. The South American was killed. The airliner ditched on the river. Prompt action by Bolling Crash Rescue in their three 42-foot crash boats saved all the passengers and crew.
The passengers in the recent crash weren't so lucky.
Dad was head of the Air Force Accident Investigation Board for the Military District of Washington. I went with him to look at a couple of non-fatal military crashes in the Washington DC area, out of those he had to investigate, both non-fatal and fatal.
A B-25 twin-engine light bomber tried an emergency landing in a large forest clearing in northern Virginia. They plowed into the woods at the edge of the clearing. The pilot and co-pilot lucked out. When we arrived to look over the wreckage a good sized tree still stood between their seats.
It occurs to me now that growing up in the Air Force, I probably heard about more plane wrecks than the average person.
We lived on Bolling AFB within the city limits of Washington DC during 1951-55.
Among other things, Bolling AFB is the headquarters of the Defense Intelligence Agency, the military intelligence center that analyzes foreign militaries, their order of battle, and their capabilities. Our military attaches assigned to US Embassies overseas collect such intelligence and report it back to DIA.
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white, With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East."
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to Ricardo)
The question remains, why was there a communication breakdown between DCA and the army? The black box has been found, I’m interested in the flight path data and the communication between the tower and the passenger jet. And how the tower was staffed that night.
I’m also as superstitious as the next idiot. I remember the rube from some deep redneck holler who drove to DC to shoot up a pizza place in Madams Organ because he reckoned there were blood sucking democrats in the basement draining the bodily fluids of children. That’s a bit far fetched for me. But if I were a Roman general I’d view the crash as an omen. It feels like some kind of premonitory moment, but that’s just my intuition and gut feeling. As a libtard who’s read William Shirer.
Posts: 3497
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to estebanana)
According to reports, there are usually four air traffic controllers in the Reagan airport tower, including one who concentrates on military helicopters because of the military traffic along the Potomac. At the time of the collision, there were only two, and no one responsible for communicating with military helicopter traffic. These are initial reports, and we will know more as the investigation proceeds.
Regarding William Shirer, his "Rise and Fall of the Third Reich" holds up very well since its publication in 1960. I particularly liked his "Berlin Diary: 1930-1941," much of which he used as material for "The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich."
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white, With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East."
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to BarkellWH)
I’ve been advocating to people for the last ten years to read Rise and Fall, seems I was not off the mark.
It’s a grandly ironic statement about our culture that the airport at the nations capitol is named after a president who was unsupportive of ATC personnel. You’d think they would have opted for John Glenn International or James Lovell International. I’d be more confident about flying into Lovell International, named after a guy who semi dead sticked a coupled together space re-entry vehicle to a safe water landing. Another name that would be cool is Kelly Johnson International, the brilliant aerodynamics engineer. Other names which could work as well as Reagan international, would be Pancho Villa, Cleopatra, Winston Churchill, Anwar Sadat, Lucretia Borgia or Marie Currie International, simply based on the fact that they didn’t beef with ATC personnel.
But next time I visit DC I’m either going to Dulles ( how dull) or I’m going to keep repeating to myself, Lovell, it’s Lovell airport. Lovell, Lovell, Lovell.
It’s extremely sad to understand that among others, the people killed in this tragedy were a significant portion of the pool of young athletes from which our future Olympic skating teams will be chosen.
Posts: 15725
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to estebanana)
The expert consensus on this seems to be that the pilot and crew of the helicopter had visual on the plane in line behind the one they hit. The tower kept asking and they kept saying YES we see it. Wrong one. They couldn’t see it due to a line of sight coincidence that blinded them to it based on night vision plus back ground. IN other words a 1 in a gazillion freak accident. They were supposed to drop to 200 feet, however, that is AFTER they cross the Wilson bridge (is my understanding), hence their concern was the plane behind, so that is also a crazy coincidence that the airliner came right in at the exact altitude as the helicopter. It looks like it was a crazy freak coincidence of all the universe lining up perfectly to make this thing happen.
Posts: 3487
Joined: Jan. 20 2004
From: Austin, Texas USA
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to Ricardo)
Yes, maybe confusion about which plane the chopper pilot had in sight, but also incredibly bad luck. If either aircraft had followed the same path a couple of seconds earlier or later, it would have been a near miss rather than a tragedy.
Posts: 3497
Joined: Jul. 12 2009
From: Washington, DC
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to Ricardo)
quote:
They were supposed to drop to 200 feet, however, that is AFTER they cross the Wilson bridge (is my understanding), hence their concern was the plane behind, so that is also a crazy coincidence that the airliner came right in at the exact altitude as the helicopter.
Yet at the time of the collision the helicopter was estimated flying at 375 to 400 feet. The big question would seem to be why were they flying at that altitude when they should have been at 200 feet? And as they were experienced helicopter pilots in touch with the tower, why did the tower not notice that altitude discrepancy?
Bill
_____________________________
And the end of the fight is a tombstone white, With the name of the late deceased, And the epitaph drear, "A fool lies here, Who tried to hustle the East."
Posts: 15725
Joined: Dec. 14 2004
From: Washington DC
RE: DC plane/helicopter crash (in reply to BarkellWH)
quote:
ORIGINAL: BarkellWH
quote:
They were supposed to drop to 200 feet, however, that is AFTER they cross the Wilson bridge (is my understanding), hence their concern was the plane behind, so that is also a crazy coincidence that the airliner came right in at the exact altitude as the helicopter.
Yet at the time of the collision the helicopter was estimated flying at 375 to 400 feet. The big question would seem to be why were they flying at that altitude when they should have been at 200 feet? And as they were experienced helicopter pilots in touch with the tower, why did the tower not notice that altitude discrepancy?
Bill
The Tower did notice and kept asking if they could see the cj whatever, commercial jet. YES THEY DID, but wrong one. They fly a little higher to get over the Wilson Bridge then drop to 200. The jet would have missed if not diverted to the OTHER landing strip at a diagonal. By turning diagonal the helicopter still could not see them, coming right at them (like nothing is moving in front going left to right, up or down, so it appears from such a precise angle), the jet DROPPED from 400 down to exactly and coincidently the altitude they were going to use to go over the bridge.
Like playing baseball, you are out in right field and the guy hits it toward center you run that way, look up and the ball is in angle with the sun, you see nothing and wonder where it where land just before it hits you in the forehead. That type of thing.
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