A jet with 60 passengers and four crew members aboard collided Wednesday night with an Army helicopter while landing at Ronald Reagan National Airport near Washington, prompting a large search-and-rescue operation in the nearby Potomac River.
Here is everything we know so far.
Plane crashed into Army helicopter on descent to runway
American Airlines Flight 5342 was inbound to the airport at an altitude of about 400 feet and a speed of about 140 miles per hour when it suffered a rapid loss of altitude over the Potomac River, according to data from its radio transponder.
A few minutes before landing, air traffic controllers asked the arriving commercial jet if it could land on the shorter Runway 33 at Reagan National and the pilots said they were able.
Less than 30 seconds before the crash, an air traffic controller asked the helicopter if it had the arriving plane in sight.
The controller made another radio call to the helicopter moments later: “PAT 25 pass behind the CRJ.” Seconds after that, the two aircraft collided.
Map showing the final moments of an American Airlines passenger plane just before it collided mid-air with a military helicopter and crashed into the Potomac River in Washington DC on Wednesday January 29 (Photo by John SAEKI / AFP) (Photo by JOHN SAEKI/AFP via Getty Images)
‘We don’t believe there are any survivors’
Chief of the Washington DC Fire and Emergency Medical Services department, John Donnelly, confirmed the switch from a rescue to recovery operation at a press conference this afternoon.
“We are now at the point where we are switching from a rescue operation to a recovery operation,” he said.
“At this point we don’t believe there are any survivors from this accident.”
He confirmed 27 people from the plane and one person from the helicopter had been recovered from the water.
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Missing woman’s harrowing final texts
A man whose wife was aboard the flight which has revealed his harrowing last messages with her moments before the crash.
Hamaad Raza has explained that the flight was so close that his wife had found a phone signal and could text him about their imminent landing.
“She texted me that they were landing in 20 minutes. The rest of my texts didn’t get delivered and that’s when I realised that something might be up,” he told the WUSA news team at the airport.
A glance at his phone shows that the final message he sent her was: “Haven’t landed yet?”
Speaking to reporters he said: “I’m just praying that someone is pulling her out of the river right now as we speak.”
Search operation underway
There are currently about 300 responders working on a “highly complex” operation.
Inflatable rescue boats were launched into the Potomac River from a point along the George Washington Parkway, just north of the airport.
First responders have also set up light towers from the shore to illuminate the area near the collision site.
Champion skaters on plane
US Figure Skating has confirmed that “several” members of its skating community were on board the American Airlines.
World champion Russian figure skaters are also reported to be aboard crashed US plane
Russian figure skaters and coaches Yevgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov were aboard the plane, Russian state-run TASS news agency has reported, citing a source.
Shishkova and Naumov, who were married, won the world championship in pairs figure skating in 1994.
Army investigating incident
Pete Hegseth, sworn in days ago as defense secretary, posted on social media that an investigation has been “launched immediately” by the Army and the Defense Department.
The US Army described the helicopter as a UH-60 Blackhawk based at Fort Belvoir in Virginia.
It is said to have been on a training flight.
Military aircraft frequently conduct training flights in and around the congested and heavily-restricted airspace around the nation’s capital for familiarisation and continuity of government planning.
Trump blames air traffic controllers and helicopter crew
President Donald Trump appeared to blame on the helicopter crew and air traffic controllers in a post on Truth Social.
“The helicopter was going straight at the airplane for an extended period of time. It is a CLEAR NIGHT, the lights on the plane were blazing, why didn’t the helicopter go up or down, or turn,” Trump wrote.
“Why didn’t the control tower tell the helicopter what to do instead of asking if they saw the plane. This is a bad situation that looks like it should have been prevented. NOT GOOD!!!”
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News Catch Up – Thursday 30 January