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Passenger Jet and Black Hawk Helicopter Collide in Midair; Frantic Search for Survivors after Midair Plane Collison. Aired 4:30- 5a ET
Aired January 30, 2025 - 04:30 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
[04:30:00]
RICHARD QUEST, CNN AVIATION CORRESPONDENT (via phone): ... things in the water, it never gets any easier, never.
OMAR JIMENEZ, CNN ANCHOR: Yes, no winners here. Richard Quest, really appreciate the time and perspective.
I want to bring in Keith Tonkin. He's an aviation expert and the Managing Director of Aviation Projects. He joins us from Brisbane, Australia. You know, we were just talking with Richard there.
Look, there are a lot of different factors going on here. Obviously, at the core of this, there are family members hoping to get some semblance of any news really about their loved ones, which we haven't seen in a concrete fashion to this point. However, there are also many questions over how this could have happened to begin with. And that's where I'll start with you.
Based on the video we've seen, the air traffic control audio that we've heard and the flight path, what sticks out to you about how this happened?
KEITH TONKIN, AVIATION EXPERT: It's good to be with you, Omar. Yes, it must be terribly distressing for the family and friends of the people involved in this horrendous accident. And the information available at the moment indicates that the American Airlines aircraft, having changed runways, was on final approach when the pilots could reasonably expect to be concentrating singly and only on landing that aircraft safely.
And the Army Black Hawk has been asked to maneuver to avoid that aircraft and for some reason hasn't done that. That's inexplicable at the moment, and we're desperately interested in finding out what happened and why that occurred.
JIMENEZ: And, you know, typically in helicopters and commercial planes, planes of all different classifications, but there might be an automated warning system. Based on what we know about the types of aircraft involved here, what types of warning systems would have been typically on some of these aircraft? And would they have made a difference in, again, what we know based on the factors available so far? TONKIN: Yes, different aircraft have different systems on board, traffic collision avoidance systems or airborne collision avoidance systems. And they are designed to detect and provide indications to the pilots that they should conduct some sort of maneuver to avoid another aircraft, or at least to draw attention to another aircraft. And some of those systems are inhibited when the aircraft is close to the ground, particularly when it's configured to land with gear down and flaps out, when the aircraft is not as responsive as you might like it to be, to be able to conduct those avoiding maneuvers.
And I don't know the specifics of this aircraft or the systems on board, but it's probably unlikely that that system on board was very helpful at the time, particularly because the helicopter was being asked to visually avoid the airliner. The helicopter pilots would really have been relying on seeing a void by looking out the window, seeing the aircraft, identifying it, and attempting to avoid it.
JIMENEZ: And on that portion of the air traffic control audio, again, based on that audio, it does seem that even if it was just a matter of seconds, that the Black Hawk helicopter did acknowledge in some way that there was another aircraft there. If there is that acknowledgement, again, I believe the time is about 13 seconds or so, why would it have been difficult even at that portion to try and move visually out of the way?
TONKIN: Well, for the helicopter, they've probably got a better chance of being able to maneuver because they'll be lighter and they'll be configured to fly in the cruise configuration as opposed to the landing American Airlines aircraft, which would have been flying slow, had high drag devices out, high lift devices out and landing gear down with the engines at a pretty low setting so that they wouldn't have been in a position to rapidly provide thrust and then to be able to be maneuvered out of the way. So they were really up against it if they were able to identify and respond in time to that collision.
JIMENEZ: Keith Tonkin, really appreciate the time and perspective. Thank you for being here.
TONKIN: You bet.
JIMENEZ: Now we're continuing to follow the deadly midair collision in Washington. Our coverage is going to continue. We're going to have the latest on what we know, including the response from the American Airlines CEO right after a short break.
[04:05:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
JIMENEZ: Welcome back, everyone. We're continuing to follow the breaking news of the plane and helicopter collision near Reagan National Airport near Washington, D.C. A law enforcement source tells CNN authorities have confirmed fatalities. And this camera captured the moment when the American Airlines flight and the Blackhawk military helicopter collided. You see the helicopter coming in from the left and then the burst of light. That, of course, is the moment of impact.
Emergency teams are conducting search and rescue efforts in the frigid Potomac River where the aircraft crashed. Officials say there were 64 people on board the plane and three soldiers in the helicopter.
U.S. Figure Skating, the national governing body of the sport, confirmed to CNN that, quote, several members of the skating community, unquote, were on board the plane. And Russian state media, citing a source, said that two world champion Russian figure skaters were also on board. CNN's Natasha Bertrand has more on the incident.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
[04:10:00]
NATASHA BERTRAND, CNN NATIONAL SECURITY CORRESPONDENT: If you live in Washington, D.C., you see these Blackhawks flying around all the time. It is extremely common for them to be flying around going in and out of Joint Base Anacostia-Bolling, which is just across the river. They can carry, you know, a significant amount of weight, a large number of people relatively to other helicopters. They can carry up to 14 people.
And so something really had to have gone very, very wrong here for them to be involved in an accident just because, again, it is so common to see them flying around. It is such a heavily kind of traffic area with military helicopters, with D.C. police helicopters.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
JIMENEZ: And given the number of different aircraft at various levels of government, it is one of the most complicated airspaces in the United States. And as this happened, or after this happened, I should say, the CEO of American Airlines now says he will be heading to Washington, D.C., to assess the collision and support families of those who were on the plane.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ROBERT ISOM, CEO, AMERICAN AIRLINES: American Eagle Flight 5342, operated by PSA Airlines, a CRJ-700 aircraft traveling from Wichita, Kansas, to Washington Reagan National Airport, has been involved in an accident near Washington, D.C. It appears to have collided with a military aircraft on approach.
Flight 5342 was under the command of four crew members and carried 60 passengers for a total of 64 people on board. We are actively working with local, state, and federal authorities on emergency response efforts, and the American Airlines care team has been activated to assist our passengers and their families.
We're cooperating fully with the National Transportation Safety Board in its investigation and will continue to provide all the information we can. Our cooperation is without pause, and we want to learn everything we can about today's events. That work will take time, but anything we can do now, we're doing. And right now, that means focusing on taking care of all passengers and crew involved, as well as their families. Members of our GO team will be on their way to Washington, D.C., and I'll be heading there shortly as well.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
JIMENEZ: I want to bring in Mark Martin, CEO of Martin Consulting. That's an aviation safety firm that works with airlines and governments on improving safety. Mark joins me on the phone from New Delhi.
So, Mark, based on what we know to this point, look, you work with airlines and governments on improving safety. While we still don't know exactly the cause of this, what alarm bells are ringing for you based on what we know so far?
MARK MARTIN, CEO, MARTIN CONSULTING (via phone): Morning, Omar. Certainly, this is a dark day in aviation, and probably a black banned event for aviation over the last 100 years. Nearly, you know, nearly $20 billion are spent on improving safety for aircraft, including airspace management.
Technologies to prevent this very same incident for crew were invented and created 60 years ago. There's 1 trillion percent chance of this -- some an incident like this occurring. And it's unfortunate that we see something like this happen in 2025.
Now, we also must understand that, you know, that airspace from Dulles over to Fort Worth to, sorry, from Dulles to Andrews Air Force Base to Reagan is one of the busiest, most intense, heavily flown, highly patrolled helicopter and air transport airspace. And when you have something like this with a helicopter impacting an aircraft, I mean, you know, the odds of that even occurring, you know, the speeds are going to be low. The altitudes have got to be the same altitude.
And clearly something has gone catastrophic wrong, catastrophically wrong, because visibility was fine. It was only temperatures that were pretty low there. But for, you know, for the pilots disoriented to disregard an aircraft on collision course, whether one was climbing or descending is just crazy, you know. And it's something unheard of. And we should never hear of something like this.
And, you know, one would expect something like this to occur more commonly in third world countries, but certainly not the U.S. And I think the NTSB, the FAA, the U.S. Military Aviation Safety Board, everybody needs to come together to establish why this occurred and whatever the reasons, whether it's, you know, human factors or whether it's what we know in aviation or we call the shell approach, which is software, hardware, equipment, live wire, live wire, or whichever element is to be blamed.
[04:15:06]
You know, this is the time to ensure that we fix this because we should never see something like this occur again. JIMENEZ: And, you know, you mentioned the unique circumstances here of a plane actually colliding with a helicopter and how unique those circumstances have to be. And we know this plane was in its final approach likely seconds from actually touching down. Is there a difference aviation safety-wise in either training or mechanically or defense system-wise within an aircraft in protecting against collision with another plane, for example, at a higher altitude, versus collision with a helicopter, which, of course, would be at a lower one?
MARTIN: Oh, yes, absolutely. In fact, it's the same technology. And mind you, this is a helicopter with a passenger jet, not even a prop- driven turboprop or a piston aircraft.
OK, so we've got enough technologies in play. We've got ESB in, NTSB out. We've got TCAS, Airborne Collision Avoidance System.
We have aircraft control surveillance. We have primary radars, secondary radars. We've got enough technologies to prevent something like this from occurring.
We've got TCAS resolution, conflict advisory, resolution advisory. The levels of safety intervention are immense, and each are layered and tiered. But for something like this to happen, where, you know, like I said, it's a one-in-a-trillion chance.
I mean, a helicopter that flies at about 60 to 80 knots, and a descending landing aircraft which touches down at 120 knots, you know, the speeds, the typical speeds are at least 300 knots separate. When one aircraft cruises at nearly 300 knots and the other one does 120, 130 knots, it's impossible for this to happen. And I think clearly something has gone. I mean, like I said, I don't want to speculate. The guys on the helicopter are no more. We've lost the crew.
Everybody out there are mourning the loss of a family member, a friend, a colleague. And I think we should not speculate. The best thing we can do is push and urge for that investigation to take place and, you know, it should be a fair, balanced investigation because we have a military aircraft involved as well.
And I think collectively everybody needs to come together to stop something like this from happening again ever.
JIMENEZ: Yes, yes. I mean, the scenes that we're seeing right now are absolutely horrific as these search-and-rescue first responders continue to try and work through the scene on these frigid waters. Mark Martin, really appreciate the time and perspective. Thanks for being here.
MARTIN: Thanks for having me. Thanks for having me on the team. Thanks.
JIMENEZ: Of course.
Meanwhile, the U.S. president posted online that the crash, quote, looks like it should have been prevented. Donald Trump wrote that the plane was on a perfect and routine line of approach to the airport on a clear night. He asked why the helicopter didn't turn and why the control tower didn't tell the helicopter what to do.
Now, it's not immediately clear whether the president's post was based on information that he's seen or that he's been officially briefed on, but CNN is reaching out to the White House on that front.
Earlier, the president said, may God bless their souls and thank the first responders involved in rescue operations.
Now, we're also following other breaking news out of Gaza, where the release of more hostages is underway right now. The first to be freed is 20-year-old Agam Berger. The Israeli soldier was captured at a military base during the October 7th attacks, and you're looking live at the scene in Khan Younis, where 80-year-old Gadi Moses and 29-year- old Arbel Yehud are expected to be released at any moment. We're continuing to watch that.
They were taken hostage at the Nir Oz kibbutz. Five Thai nationals are also expected to be freed. Israel will release 110 Palestinian prisoners in the coming hours as well.
It's all part of the hostage and ceasefire deal agreed to by Israel and Hamas earlier this month. Four female Israeli soldiers were released on Saturday. And remember, this is phase one of the plan.
Phase one calls for the release of 33 hostages held in Gaza and nearly 2,000 Palestinian prisoners.
All right, back to the breaking news we've been following for hours now. We're taking a close look at the first images of the jet and the helicopter in the water when our breaking news coverage of the midair collision continues after the break.
[04:20:00]
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
JIMENEZ: All right, everyone welcome back. A quick update on the midair collision near Washington.
Right now, divers are combing through the freezing Potomac River, hoping to find more victims. I should note, we are now past eight hours since the incident, and sources told us the prospects are getting more grim. After rescue workers confirmed some fatalities, but to this point, we've had no reports of survivors.
Earlier, when American Airlines passenger jet collided with the military helicopter, it seems to be captured by this video and that fireball you just observed. As the two aircraft collided, it seems to show that helicopter ramming into the plane before both aircraft went down into the river.
[04:25:03]
The passenger jet is similar to this one that you're seeing here, but it had 64 people on board. The helicopter had three crew members who were on a training flight. The jet was headed to Reagan National Airport, which will be closed until at least 11 a.m. today.
And if you believe you may have loved ones on board American Airlines Flight 5342, you can call this number. Toll-free 800-679-8215 for more information if you're in the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, or the U.S. Virgin Islands. Or visit the American Airlines website at news.aa.com for more phone numbers.
We're expecting a press conference from officials in about two and a half hours. I'm Omar Jimenez. Thank you for joining us this hour of CNN "THIS MORNING" will have more live coverage just ahead.