NYT reported a shortage of dispatchers at Washington airport at the time of the crash
The dispatch shift at the time of the collision of an airplane with a helicopter at Ronald Reagan National Airport in Washington was incomplete, while one specialist was handling several tasks at once, including the coordination of helicopter traffic and aircraft landing. The New York Times reported on January 30, citing a preliminary internal report from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).
"The dispatcher who operated the helicopters in the airport area Wednesday night also instructed the planes that were landing and taking off from its runways. These tasks are usually assigned to two dispatchers rather than one," the publication said.
According to the report, the staff shortage made coordination difficult because airplane and helicopter pilots use different radio frequencies and cannot always hear each other. The newspaper noted that the problem of dispatcher shortages is an issue across the United States, and the change of dispatchers at the airport in Washington "has been understaffed for years."
For example, the publication continued, the airport had 19 certified professionals working at the airport in September 2023, compared to a target level of 30. Due to staffing shortages, many dispatchers have to work up to six days a week and 10 hours a day.
According to Reuters, the crew of the Black Hawk helicopter consisted of experienced pilots who wore night vision devices. In turn, German pilot and aviation expert Peter Gatz suggested that the cause of the crash could have been a mistake by the air traffic controllers.
On the night of January 30, near Ronald Reagan National Airport in Washington, a passenger plane American Airlines and a military helicopter Black Hawk collided, after the accident they fell into the Potomac River. A total of 60 passengers and four crew members were aboard the plane. There were three military personnel in the helicopter. The television company NBC News reported that the bodies of more than 30 victims were extracted from the water. In turn, US President Donald Trump reported on the absence of survivors in the airplane crash in Washington.
Later it was reported that in the plane, preliminary, there were eight skaters and four coaches. The Boston Figure Skating Club said the coaches, world champion figure skaters Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, were on board, along with hopeful junior skaters and their parents. In addition to them, former figure skater Inna Volyanskaya was on the plane. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov confirmed that Russian citizens were on board the plane. The Russian Embassy in the United States expects the United States State Department to provide information about the dead Russians in the near future.
US Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said that the plane and helicopter crash could have been prevented. The same opinion is held by Trump, who believes that the collision could have been avoided if the helicopter had changed course.
