ÁñÁ«ÊÓƵ

The plane collided with a U.S. Army helicopter just before 9 p.m. Wednesday as the plane prepared to land at Washington Reagan National Airport in Arlington County.

The plane, carrying 60 passengers and four crew members, was operated by PSA Airlines, part of the American Airlines Group. National Transportation Safety Board investigators recovered the cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder from the Bombardier CRJ700 airplane, agency spokesperson Peter Knudson said Thursday. The devices were at the agency's labs for evaluation.

The Black Hawk helicopter was part of the 12th Aviation Battalion stationed at Fort Belvoir in Fairfax, Virginia. The Army pilot and two other soldiers were aboard the helicopter for what Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth described as a "routine, annual retraining flight" for continuity of government plans in case of a disaster.

Recovery operations underway

On Thursday afternoon authorities were still recovering bodies from the wreckage in the Potomac River and notifying families of those killed in the crash. At least 28 bodies were retrieved. The bodies were received by the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner in Washington, D.C., which has jurisdiction over the waters in which both aircraft were submerged.

The bodies of all three soldiers who were on the Army helicopter were recovered, U.S. officials said. Officials said the remains will be at Air Force Mortuary Affairs Operations at Dover Air Force Base in Delaware, which coordinates the dignified transfer of fallen service members. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss details not yet announced. No identities of the crew were released.

Numerous passengers on the American Airlines regional plane were returning from an ice skating competition and training camp in Wichita, Kansas. The death toll includes Inna Volyanskaya, a Russian-born ice-skating instructor at a Virginia rink. Not all of the victims' names are public.

Some family members were en route to the scene, but others already were at the airport Thursday morning, after emergency responders worked through the night in the frigid river. American and PSA opened a family assistance center in Bethesda, Md.

“Our deepest condolences go out to all the families and friends impacted during this tragedy, and we will support them through this difficult time," Maj. Gen. Trevor J. Bredenkamp, commander of the Joint Task Force-National Capital Region/U.S. Army Military District of Washington.

"Our top priority is to assist in the recovery efforts, while fully cooperating with the National Transportation Safety Board, the Federal Aviation Administration, and other investigative agencies to determine the cause of this tragic incident,� Bredenkamp said in a statement on the aviation battalion website.

FAA: Control tower staffing was 'not normal'

Air crash investigations can take months, and federal investigators told reporters they would not speculate on the cause.

The plane was found upside-down in three sections in waist-deep water, and first responders were searching miles of the Potomac, said John Donnelly, the fire chief in the nation’s capital. The helicopter wreckage also was found. Images from the river showed boats around the partly submerged wing and the mangled wreckage of the plane’s fuselage.

American Airlines CEO Robert Isom said the plane was making a normal approach when “the military aircraft came into the path� of the jet.

One air traffic controller was responsible for coordinating helicopter traffic and arriving and departing planes when the collision happened, according to a report by the Federal Aviation Administration that was obtained by The Associated Press. Those duties are often divided between two people, but the airport typically combines the roles at 9:30 p.m., once traffic begins to slow. On Wednesday the tower supervisor directed that they be combined earlier.

“The position configuration was not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic,� the report said.

A person familiar with the matter, however, said the tower staffing that night was at a normal level. The positions are regularly combined when controllers need to step away from the console for breaks, during shift changes or when air traffic is slow, that person said, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss internal procedures.

The Federal Aviation Administration has long struggled with a shortage of air traffic controllers.

A top Army aviation official said the crew of the Black Hawk was “very experienced� and familiar with the congested flying that occurs daily around the city.

“Both pilots had flown this specific route before, at night. This wasn’t something new to either one of them,� said Jonathan Koziol, chief of staff for Army aviation.

The helicopter's maximum allowed altitude at the time was 200 feet, Koziol said. It was not immediately clear whether it exceeded that limit, but Hegseth said altitude seemed to be a factor in the collision.

Koziol said investigators need to analyze the flight data before making conclusions.

Trump says helicopter should have seen plane

President Donald Trump initially struck a somber tone at a White House news conference Thursday morning after Wednesday night's deadly crash.

He began the briefing with a moment of silence for the 67 victims and their families. "We're all searching for answers," he said.

However, the Republican president then attacked previous administrations under Democratic Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden for allegedly lowering standards for people hired as air traffic controllers because of "diversity, equity and inclusion" initiatives he banned from federal government since taking office.

"We don't know that necessarily it was the controller's fault," Trump said, after also questioning why the pilot of the Army helicopter did not see and avoid the incoming plane on "a very clear night."

"The turn it made was not the correct turn," he said of the helicopter.

Trump said, "The people in the helicopter should have seen where they were going." He added: "The helicopter obviously was in the wrong place at the wrong time and a tragedy occurred."

Hegseth, in his first test after the Senate confirmed him last week, followed the president and said, "No excuses. We're going to get to the bottom of this."

"Tragically last night, a mistake was made," Hegseth said.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., and other Senate Democrats put the blame on Trump, asserting that he undermined federal oversight of aviation security.

During a news conference to protest backroom deliberations by Republicans over Trump's nominee for budget director, Kaine said Trump stripped the membership of the Aviation Security Advisory Committee, created in 1988 after the PanAm Flight 103 bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland.

Kaine also recalled his questioning of Russell Vought, Trump's nominee to head the Office of Management and Budget, over a speech in which Vought said he wanted to put federal employees "into trauma."

He asked Vought then, "You don't want federal air traffic controllers to go to the airport traumatized, do you, Mr. Vought?"

Vought said he did not, but Kaine returned to the exchange on Thursday morning, after the fatal crash.

"We just did a bill to try to bulk up the nation's air traffic controllers because we've been short of air traffic controllers, and now the Russ Vought strategy is to try to traumatize the federal workforce," the senator said. "That lands particularly hard with me this morning."

Virginia leaders express sorrow, seek answers

Virginia's leaders expressed sorrow and pledged to seek answers following Wednesday night's deadly crash.

Officials said Thursday morning that the rescue effort became a recovery effort and all 67 people aboard the two aircraft were feared dead.

Gov. Glenn Youngkin said on NBC's "Today" Show that from what he has learned the plane appeared to be making a normal approach before the deadly crash around 9 p.m. Wednesday.

"This flight from Wichita to D.C. was making a normal approach and what I've been told is everything was normal. Of course, it wasn't," Youngkin said.

"This tragic collision which brought down both aircrafts into the Potomac," he said, "with the American Airlines flight inverting in the river, brought down with it tragically 60 passengers, four crew from the American Airlines flight and three crew from the military helicopter."

Youngkin said, "notwithstanding the heroic actions from the first responders overnight" involving rescue personnel from Virginia, D.C., Maryland, the Coast Guard and other federal resources, there is the "just heart-breaking reality this morning" that "they've had to move from rescue to recovery."

He said the NTSB is leading the investigation "with our full cooperation and support."

"We've pledged everything," he told Fox News in one of a series of televised interviews after he arrived at Reagan National on Thursday morning.

Youngkin said he spoke with Robert Isom, CEO of American Airlines.

"They're going through the painful process of contacting families and crew members," Youngkin said. "They said they've gotten to a little more than half of all the families already as of this morning."

Youngkin said he also spoke with Jennifer L. Homendy, chairwoman of the NTSB.

"They are doing, of course, the very, very difficult task of, one, supporting these families because they're on point, but also starting the investigation which is so important to find out what happened."

Kaine and U.S. Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., attended a news conference Thursday morning near the crash site, along with Rep. Don Beyer, D-8th, and Virginia Secretary of Transportation Shep Miller.

Kaine said his first reaction is sorrow for the victims, thanks for the first responders and questions about how the crash could have happened.

"There are going to be a lot of questions, obviously, a lot of questions," Kaine said. "And that's what NTSB's job is, is to be an independent investigator of incidents like this."

He added: "It's not a time to speculate. It's a time to investigate and get answers to the questions that we need, and I have confidence that will be done."

Warner expressed condolences and noted how authorities from the federal government, Virginia, Maryland and Washington quickly responded.

"When tragedy happens, all of those distinctions between the various jurisdictions and our federal partners all disappear."

Volume of traffic at Reagan National

In 2023, Kaine and Warner opposed legislation to loosen restrictions on the number of planes allowed to fly in and out of Reagan National.

A coalition of airlines and localities in the western and southwestern U.S. lobbied for 28 new slots — or 14 round-trip long-distance flights in and out of National, over the strong opposition from representatives in Virginia and Maryland. They argued that adding the flights at National would compromise safety and hurt operations at Washington Dulles International Airport in Loudoun County. The Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, which oversees both airports, opposed the additional flights.

Ultimately, Congress added five round-trip flights at Reagan National in the five-year reauthorization of the Federal Aviation Administration last year. The additional flights were to and from San Antonio, Seattle, San Diego, Las Vegas and San Francisco. American Airlines operates the new flights to and from San Antonio.

"Yes, this is a crowded air space, but it's a safe air space," Youngkin said Thursday in the "Today" interview. "Air travel in the United States is the safest air travel in the world and we just need to understand what happened in this circumstance."

The governor commended Reagan National for diverting 19 flights to Dulles, which he said stayed open late to receive them, along with the Washington Metro transit system.

Airlines diverted two flights overnight from Reagan National to Richmond International Airport, airport spokesman Troy Bell said

The Richmond airport did not have a passenger count, Bell said.

The airport makes cots and water available as airlines work on other assistance, including ground transportation.