American Airlines plane with 64 on board crashes into Black Hawk military helicopter (Sikorksy H-60 helicopter) while landing at Washington D.C. AA Flight 5342 from Wichita,Kansas id as passenger plane. Search crews scour nearby Potomac River where jetliner crashed. No survivors.
An American Airlines passenger plane collided into a military helicopter while coming in for landing at Reagan National Airport in Washington. The passenger plane was carrying 60 passengers and four flight crew.
Rescue crews are scouring the Potomac River near the airport in the hope that there are survivors. Reports told of the crash occurring just before 9pm, Wednesday night.
An estimated 64 persons were on American Airlines plane, Flight 5342 from Wichita, Kansas, to the Capital when the collision happened.
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Webcam at the Kennedy Center caught an explosion mid-air across the Potomac. https://t.co/v75sxitpH6 pic.twitter.com/HInYdhBYs5
— Alejandro Alvarez (@aletweetsnews) January 30, 2025
Mid-air collision took place at low altitude
The Federal Aviation Authority said that the jet, a Bombardier CRJ700, collided with a Sikorksy H-60 helicopter while on approach to Runway 33.
Surveillance video from the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., shows a small aircraft, presumably the helicopter, colliding with the passenger jet at a low altitude followed by a bright explosion. Radar tracking sites show the passenger jet appears to have fallen into the frigid Potomac River.
Officials to date have yet to say what may have caused the descending AA aircraft colliding into the helicopter.
At least three soldiers were on board the military helicopter at the time of the mid air collision.
Captain Jonathan Campos & First Officer Samuel Lilley id as doomed AA pilots
Is Black Hawk helicopter & traffic control tower error to blame for American Airlines collision?
BREAKING: A plane has collided midair with a Black Hawk helicopter while trying to land at Ronald Reagan National Airport outside Washington, D.C., on Wednesday, officials said. The plane, operated by American Airlines, then crashed into the Potomac River. https://t.co/xFX8j3SYxf pic.twitter.com/L4AMHtFxZp
— CBS News (@CBSNews) January 30, 2025
What caused passenger plane to collide into military helicopter?
In a statement, DC Police said: ‘At 8:53pm, multiple calls were received for an aircraft crash above the Potomac River.
‘DC Fire and EMS, the Metropolitan Police Department and multiple partner agencies are currently coordinating a search and rescue operation in the Potomac River. There is no confirmed information on casualties at this time.
‘Small aircraft down in Potomac River vicinity Reagan National Airport. Fireboats on scene,’ the DC Fire and EMS Department posted on X.
The airport said in a post to X: ‘All takeoffs and landings have been halted at DCA. Emergency personnel are responding to an aircraft incident on the airfield. The terminal remains open. Will update.’
Images taken at the scene show scores of emergency service teams along the riverside.
Unconfirmed posts shared on X, stated four survivors being found alive, pulled alive from the frigid waters of the Potomac River. Follow up reports have since confirmed official reports that no one survived the crash, with officials recovering as of Friday early morning, 19 bodies.
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The last major commercial airplane accident involving a U.S. passenger plane was in 2009 when a Colgan Air flight crashed near Buffalo killing a total of 50 people (49 passengers and crew, and one person inside a house).
