A U.S. senator warned last year that allowing more flights in and out of the congested Reagan Washington National Airport could compromise air safety and even cause a deadly collision between aircraft like the one that occurred on Wednesday.
Sen. Tim Kaine (D- Virginia) issued the chilling warning in early May 2024, two weeks after a near collision between two jetliners occurred at the same Washington D.C. area airport the month before.
Kaine expressed his fears publicly as he opposed plans by fellow U.S. lawmakers to boost the number of landing slots at DCA last year as part of five-year budget legislation for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), known as reauthorization legislation.
In his speech, Kaine said the thrust of the FAA reauthorization bill aimed to promote aviation safety across the United States, but adding more flights as the bill proposed at the time was “dramatically contrary to the thrust of this bill.”
“There’s one provision in the bill that, it will not increase air safety. It will reduce air safety and it will reduce air safety in the capitol,” Kaine said.
“We should not be jamming more flights onto the busiest runway in the United States,” Kaine told fellow lawmakers, standing in front of a photo sign showing the near miss collision. “More and more planes on this busiest runway in the United States is just going to increase the chance of a significant incident.”
Kaine noted that lawmakers in the House had voted against the measure, saying: “The last thing we want is for there to be something bad to happen out at that airport and people stick a mic(rophone) in our face (and) say,’ You knew all this, you were warned and you voted for it anyway?’” Kaine said.
Other Senate lawmakers ignored Kaine’s concerns and the bill was passed. More new flights were soon added, making the airport even busier.
Search and rescue efforts are seen around a wreckage site in the Potomac River from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, early Thursday morning, Jan. 30, 2025, in Arlington, Va.
AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein
On Wednesday, an American Eagle regional jet from Wichita attempting to land at the Washington airport collided mid-air with VIP Blackhawk military helicopter on an annual training flight, triggering a fiery and deadly crash that killed all 67 people on the two aircraft.
The mid-collision came not even a year after an American Airlines affiliate started offering non-stop flights to Washington National from Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport in Wichita, but the direct Wichita flight was approved even before the latest new routes were added from Seattle, Las Vegas and San Antonio.
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At a news conference Thursday afternoon, Kaine, the unsuccessful vice-presidential nominee in 2016 as part of Hilary Clinton’s Democratic ticket, declined comment on the deadly air accident.
“We’ve been pretty plain about our concerns, but it isn’t a good time to speculate (about cause) right now,” Kaine said, standing beside another Virginia Democrat senator, Mark Warner, who has also publicly expressed concerns about safety at the capitol airport amid the rising volume of flights.
“We have faith that the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board) will provide the answers about this,” Kaine added.
Back in May 2024, Kaine told the Senate that there had already been a near miss of two commercial airline planes taxiing on the ground at Reagan Washington National Airport due to the volume of air traffic using its main runway and confusion among pilots and air traffic controllers.
Only an air traffic controller who shrieked “Stop! Stop!” into their headset saved the two jets.
In his speech, Kaine said Reagan Washington National was not designed to accommodate the more powerful and modern aircraft it now serves, adding it came from an era of smaller aircraft.
He likened Reagan Washington National to “a postage stamp” of an airport built on 860 acres of land surrounded on three sides by water and a parkway on the fourth, with limited room for expansion.
In contrast, nearby Dulles International Airport, the region’s second airport, is built on 12,000 acres. Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport sits on 19,000 acres, and Denver International Airport was erected on 32,000 acres.
Reagan National has three runways and was meant to accommodate a maximum of about 15-million passengers a year in an era when airports and airplanes were smaller and designed to be near city downtowns.
Search and rescue efforts are seen around a wreckage site in the Potomac River from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, early Thursday morning, Jan. 30, 2025, in Arlington, Va.
Mark Schiefelbein/ AP Photo
The facility now manages a staggering 25.5 million passengers a year, Kaine said.
“This airport, built for 15 million passengers which now has 25.5 million passengers a year, already has problems before you add flights,” Kaine said in 2024.
Some larger airline jets cannot use the airport’s two smaller, shorter runways, making Reagan Washington National’s largest runway the busiest in the U.S., though the airport itself is not in the top 10 overall busiest airport facilities in the country.
Reagan National is unique in terms of U.S. airports because it operates in close proximity to all of the Washington, D.C., sensitive political buildings and military installations. The airspace above and around it is closely controlled and restricted, especially since the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
A special fleet of VIP dignitary Air Force Blackhawk VH60 helicopters carries top military and other political visitors in a corridor alongside the airport, but the military and commercial airline flights have co-existed without issues for years now and are a regular sight for local residents.
That fleet of helicopters are known as “Gold Tops” because they feature different paint than regular military Blackhawks.
