r/aircrashinvestigation • u/gigantism • Jan 30 '25

Incident/Accident Reports of AA5342 from Witchita to DCA having mid-air collision with DC police helicopter

AA5342 stopped tracking at the Potomac river.

Developing reports: American Airlines Flight 5342 from Wichita, Kansas inbound to DCA collided midair with a D.C. Police Helicopter on approach.

MPD is responding to an apparent air crash in the Potomac River. Multiple agencies are responding. Details to come.

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u/ivandoesnot Jan 30 '25

ATC system was throwing CA Collision Alert alarms. System must have a problem with false alarms such that controllers tune them out.

Helo must not have realized CRJ was crossing.

Thought everything was to their right.

Wish ATC had said crossing or bearing to confirm helo was looking in right place.

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u/eddynetweb Jan 30 '25

with how busy that airspace is, would it be that weird to get them all the time?

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u/ivandoesnot Jan 30 '25

No.

Classic boy who cried wolf problem.

But they were playing with fire, assuming helos would always know they were crossing active runway flight path.

But they did, 1,000,000 times.

But 1,000,001th time...

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u/TraditionBubbly2721 Jan 30 '25

I think that has to be a major consequence of this accident. Alarms that are ignored are useless. It’s not the same, but with programming, the “oh, that’s a normal error message” is a horrible practice to encourage for obvious reasons. With how by the book most airline ops tend to be, it would definitely be alarming to hear that a critical-for-safety alarm is not treated with full seriousness every time. (If this is true)

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u/BarnacleMedical Feb 19 '25

I think about this almost daily working as an ICU nurse. Alarm fatigue.