Washington crash: Clues and questions from air traffic audio, another near-miss and ‘not normal’ staffing
New audio reveals the helicopter pilot said he was able to see the American Airlines passenger plane, and twice requested permission to manoeuvre around it by sight and without further ground support.
The audio shows how the helicopter, using the code Priority Air Transport 25 (PAT-25), specifically asked for visual separation from the CRJ (Canadair Regional Jet) passenger plane.
That means the helicopter’s pilot requested permission to proceed, taking responsibility to look out for the plane and avoid it.
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New audio reveals how the helicopter acknowledged the presence of the passenger jet before the crash
The request was in response to a question by air traffic control (ATC) asking whether they could see the passenger jet.
• ATC: “PAT-25, do you have the CRJ in sight? PAT-25, pass behind the CRJ.”
• PAT-25: “PAT25 has the traffic in sight [unintelligible], request visual separation.”
• ATC: “Confirmed.”
The helicopter made this same request again a short while later, after air traffic control again alerted them to the presence of the CRJ passenger jet.
• ATC: “PAT-25, there’s traffic just south of the Wilson Bridge, CRJ is at 1,200ft setting up for Runway 33.”
• PAT-25: “Requesting visual separation.”
• ATC: “Visual separation approved.”
It is not clear if the helicopter was responding to the wrong aircraft.
Another jet nearly hit a helicopter just 24 hours earlier
The mixing of helicopters and passenger jets around the airport had also led to confusion just 24 hours earlier.
On the evening of 28 January, a different American Airlines jet, flight 4514, had to take evasive action to avoid a helicopter near the airport.
The plane landed safely on its second attempt.
The suspected helicopter was next spotted 40 seconds later at an altitude of 1,600ft, having veered off in the opposite direction to the plane.
Staffing was ‘not normal’
As part of its investigation into Wednesday’s crash, the US National Transportation Safety Board is looking into various areas, including staffing at the airport’s air traffic control tower.
Sky’s US partner network NBC revealed that an air traffic controller left work early on the day of the crash. That allegedly left just one person to monitor both airplane and helicopter traffic.
Air traffic controllers are only allowed to operate alone after 9.30pm. The accident took place at 8.47pm.
The Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) preliminary report into the crash said staffing at Reagan Washington National Airport was “not normal” in advance of the accident.
Across the US, FAA data does show a decline in the number of air traffic controllers over the years.
The context, however, is an even larger decline in air traffic – meaning there arguably isn’t a need for as many air traffic controllers as in the past.
It also remains unclear whether air traffic control staffing levels affect passenger safety. Fatal air accidents are, thankfully, rare – but that means it’s hard to spot patterns in the data.
A more common occurrence is runway incursions – where a plane, in the grounds of the airport, goes where it isn’t supposed to be.
The vast majority of runway incursions have no safety consequences at all, but it’s a useful proxy to measure the number of mistakes on the ground.
The chart below shows the number of runway incursions per million flights has actually been falling, and last year was the lowest it’s been since the pandemic.
A board member of the National Transportation Safety Board said that staffing is likely to be only one small part of the investigation.
Investigators may also be examining the altitude of the helicopter involved in the crash.
Maps published by the FAA show that helicopters are required to stay below 200ft in the area around the airport, but flight tracking data suggests the helicopter may have been flying at 300ft in the moments before the crash.
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New footage shows moment of Washington plane crash
“With military traffic, quite a lot of the time they can negotiate these restrictions,” says Marco Chan, a senior lecturer in aviation operations at Buckinghamshire New University and an experienced pilot.
“If air traffic controllers know what’s going on with traffic in the vicinity, they can allow them to go beyond the minimum or maximum altitude.”
Investigators will need to determine if the data is accurate, and whether the helicopter had received prior authorisation to breach the altitude limit.
The videos of the collision are strikingly, shockingly clear.
The reasons are, so far, not.
The Data and Forensics team is a multi-skilled unit dedicated to providing transparent journalism from Sky News. We gather, analyse and visualise data to tell data-driven stories. We combine traditional reporting skills with advanced analysis of satellite images, social media and other open source information. Through multimedia storytelling we aim to better explain the world while also showing how our journalism is done.
Pro-Western candidate Nicusor Dan has unexpectedly beaten hard-right populist George Simion in the Romanian presidential election.
Mr Simion, 38, and his rival – a centrist who’s mayor of Bucharest – faced off in the second round of the contest.
According to the official tally, Mr Dan was leading by nearly nine percentage points with more than 98% of the votes counted.
Pic: Reuters
Mr Dan and his supporters celebrated the exit polls. Pic: Reuters
After exit polls suggested he wasn’t going to win, Trump-supporting Mr Simion rejected the result and said estimates put him 400,000 votes ahead.
Speaking after voting ended, Mr Simion said his election was “clear” as he posted on Facebook: “I won!!! I am the new President of Romania and I am giving back the power to the Romanians!”
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George Simion on Trump, the EU – and his message to UK
Romania’s last election was annulled after its highest court ruled the leading candidate, nationalist Calin Georgescu, should be disqualified due to claims of electoral interference by Russia.
The result is surprising because in the first round, 38-year-old Mr Simion, founder of the right-wing Alliance for the Unity of Romanians (AUR), took 40.96% of the vote – almost 20 points ahead.
George Simion rejected the polls but official counting saw him slip behind. Pic: Reuters
Supporters of Mr Dan celebrated on the streets of the capital Bucharest. Pic: AP
An opinion poll on Friday had it much closer, but still suggested the two men were virtually tied.
Mr Dan, a 55-year-old mathematician, is running as an independent and has pledged to clamp down on corruption.
He is also staunchly pro-EU and NATO, and has said Romania’s support for Ukraine is vital for its own security.
When voting closed at 9pm local time, 11.6 million people – about 64% of eligible voters – had cast ballots. About 1.64 million Romanians living abroad also took part.
About 11.6 million people – 64% of eligible voters – cast ballots. Pic: AP
Read more from Sky News:
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The election is being closely watched across Europe amid a rise of support for President Donald Trump.
After polls closed, Mr Dan said “elections are not about politicians” but about communities and that in the latest vote “a community of Romanians has won, a community that wants a profound change in Romania”.
“When Romania goes through difficult times, let us remember the strength of this Romanian society,” he said.
“There is also a community that lost today’s elections. A community that is rightly outraged by the way politics has been conducted in Romania up to now.”
Israel has said it will allow a “basic quantity of food” into the besieged enclave of Gaza to avoid a “starvation crisis” following a near three-month blockade.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said the decision was “based on the operational need to enable the expansion of the military operation to defeat Hamas”.
Gaza, where local authorities say more than 53,000 people have died in Israel’s 19-month campaign, has been under a complete blockade on humanitarian aid since 2 March.
It comes as global food security experts warn of famine across the territory and after a UN-backed report issued last Monday which warned one in five people in Gaza were facing starvation.
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Israel ramps up bombing in Gaza
The statement from the prime minister’s office said it would “allow a basic quantity of food to be brought in for the population in order to make certain that no starvation crisis develops in the Gaza Strip”.
“Such a crisis would endanger the continuation of Operation ‘Gideon’s Chariots’ to defeat Hamas,” it added.
“Israel will act to deny Hamas’s ability to take control of the distribution of humanitarian assistance in order to ensure that the assistance does not reach the Hamas terrorists.”
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Gaza is ‘a slaughterhouse’ says surgeon
It comes after a British surgeon working in Gaza said in a video to Sky News the enclave is now “a slaughterhouse” amid Israeli bombardment.
Israel has just ramped up its offensive in Gaza, with Palestinian health officials reporting at least 130 people were killed overnight into Sunday.
Israel Defence Forces (IDF) confirmed troops had begun “extensive ground operations throughout the northern and southern Gaza Strip”.
The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said 464 people had died in Israeli military strikes in the week to Sunday.
Listen to The World with Richard Engel and Yalda Hakim every Wednesday
In a statement on Sunday, IDF said its air force struck “over 670 Hamas terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip to disrupt enemy preparations and support ground operations” over the past week.
Israel has launched an escalation to increase pressure on Hamas, seize territory, displace Palestinians to the south and take greater control over the distribution of aid.
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A British surgeon working in southern Gaza has compared the region to a “slaughterhouse” because of the daily bombardment from Israeli forces.
Dr Tom Potokar, who is based at the European Hospital near Khan Younis in southern Gaza, offered his assessment of Israel’s military offensive after Palestinian health officials reported at least 130 people were killed overnight into Sunday.
Israel Defence Forces (IDF) have confirmed their troops have begun “extensive ground operations throughout the northern and southern Gaza Strip”.
In a video, Dr Potokar said it was “another day of devastation here in Gaza”, adding: “The stories coming from the north… absolutely horrific… particularly around the Indonesian Hospital.”
“I mean, it’s difficult to describe in words what’s happening here… [with the] constant sound of bombardment jets overhead.
“If Cambodia was the killing fields, then Gaza now is the slaughterhouse.”
Mourners at a funeral of Palestinians killed in Israeli strikes, at Al Shifa hospital, in Gaza. Pic: Reuters
His reference to Cambodia’s killing fields refers to when more than a million people were murdered in mass executions and buried by the extreme communist guerrilla group, the Khmer Rouge, under Pol Pot, between 1975 and 1979.
The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said 464 people had died in Israeli military strikes in the week to Sunday.
In a statement on Sunday, IDF said its air force struck “over 670 Hamas terror targets throughout the Gaza Strip to disrupt enemy preparations and support ground operations” over the past week.
A family in grief at a funeral on Sunday in Deir al Balah, central Gaza. Pic: Reuters
Dr Potokar described the impact on those on the ground, saying: “We’ve been operating all morning so far and [treating] awful explosive injuries… [including] one young woman with leg fracture and shoulder fracture and a large wound on her buttock, who came in yesterday and is not yet aware that everyone in our family was killed in the onslaught.”
Israel has launched an escalation of its war in Gaza to ramp up pressure on Hamas, seize territory, displace Palestinians to the south and take greater control over the distribution of aid.
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Israel ramps up bombing in Gaza
On Sunday, it announced and launched “extensive” new ground operations in Gaza.
It came after airstrikes killed more than 100 people, including dozens of children, overnight and into Sunday, hospitals and medics said, and forced northern Gaza’s main hospital to close.
A spokesperson for the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza said: “Complete families were wiped off the civil registration record by Israeli bombardment”.
The ministry also said the bombardment had forced the closure of the Indonesian Hospital, the main hospital serving people in northern Gaza.
Nasser hospital, in the southern city of Khan Younis, said more than 48 people – mostly women and children – were killed in the area which includes tents sheltering displaced people.
In Deir al Balah, in central Gaza, at least 12 people were killed in three separate strikes, according to Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital and the Nuseirat camp’s Awda Hospital.
Meanwhile, the Gaza health ministry and the Palestinian Civil Defence – which operates under the Hamas-run government – reported that 19 people were killed in several strikes in Jabalia in northern Gaza.
The Israeli military had no immediate comment on the strikes.
Read more from Sky News:
How Israel has escalated Gaza bombing campaign
Ceasefire talks are taking place in Qatar this weekend – with Israel saying they involve discussions on ending the war as well as a truce and hostage deal.
A statement from the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said any lasting truce must include the demilitarisation of Gaza as well as the exile of Hamas militants.
But a senior Israeli official added there had been little progress so far during talks in Qatar’s capital Doha.
Sky News Arabia reported Hamas had proposed freeing about half its Israeli hostages in exchange for a two-month ceasefire and the release of Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.
A Palestinian official close to the discussions said: “Hamas is flexible about the number of hostages it can free, but the problem has always been over Israel’s commitment to end the war.”
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