‘systemic Failures’ Caused Washington Midair Crash, Says Ntsb Chair

The fatal midair collision in Washington last year was the result of “deep, underlying, systemic failures” that aligned to cause the worst aviation disaster in more than two decades, the nation’s top transportation accident investigator said Tuesday.

The remarks from Jennifer Homendy, chair of the National Transportation Safety Board, kicked off a daylong meeting in Washington during which the independent agency will vote on the incident’s probable cause and issue safety recommendations.

The crash above the Potomac River between a regional PSA Airlines jet and an Army Black Hawk helicopter killed 67 people, sparking sharp scrutiny of both the military and Federal Aviation Administration.

“Today, you will hear how deep, underlying, systemic failures — system flaws — aligned to create the conditions that led to this devastating tragedy,” Homendy said. She cited the airspace design around Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, the “limitations” of pilots using “see-and-avoid” mid-flight — visually scanning for other aircraft — and “failures of entire organizations to evaluate and act on readily available data, heed repeated recommendations and foster robust safety cultures.”

Homendy didn’t name the Army or FAA in her opening remarks.

The proceedings come just two days before the first anniversary of the disaster. The NTSB is poised to dive into wide-ranging problems.

“Any individual shortcomings were set up by the systems around them,” said Michael Graham, one of the NTSB’s members.

During a separate fact-finding hearing over the summer, the NTSB heard testimony from the FAA, the Army and others to help piece together last year’s incident, which seemed to be a catastrophe that almost everyone saw coming.

There was a risky helicopter route — and a previous push to close it that fizzled out. Overworked air traffic controllers. A feverish pace of flights at Reagan National. A history of near-misses between between planes and helicopters.

Then, the night of the disaster, the Black Hawk was flying higher than it should have been, possibly due to a faulty device that determines an aircraft’s altitude, called an altimeter. Moreover, the helicopter might not have heard a key directive from a controller — all while the military crew is believed to have been wearing night vision goggles, which are difficult to use in urban environments like Washington.

An advanced location-transmitting technology wasn’t broadcasting on the helicopter, either, and even if it was, the jet involved in the crash didn’t have a device that would allow it to directly receive the information. (It’s not certified for that plane, according to testimony last year.) The former equipment is called Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast Out, or ADS-B Out, while the latter is known as ADS-B In.

The Justice Department has admitted that the federal government is liable in the incident.

The FAA has worked to address concerns about the airspace, permanently closing the helicopter route near Reagan National with limited exceptions for “essential” flights such as transporting the president.

The agency has also required ADS-B Out broadcasting around the area in most cases, and it has reviewed other “hot spot” airports nationwide where helicopters and planes fly close to one another. The Transportation Department, too, has launched a sprawling effort, using $12.5 billion from last summer’s GOP domestic policy law, to revamp the FAA’s aging infrastructure and technology. And DOT says it has boosted staffing at Reagan National, Congress’ favorite airport.

The Army, meanwhile, has distributed new ADS-B In devices, and it suspended certain helicopter flights to the Pentagon after a separate incident in May, when two commercial jets aborted their landings at Reagan National due to a nearby Black Hawk. The status of this pause is unclear.