‪No Survivors In DC Mid-Air Collision: Black Boxes Still Missing‬

Investigators have yet to recover the flight data recorders from the plane and military helicopter involved in a deadly mid-air collision near the US capital, Washington, D.C., officials said Thursday.

“We know they’re there. They are underwater. This is not unusual for the NTSB (National Transportation Safety Board). We have many times recovered flight data recorders in water,” NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy said at a briefing at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

The NTSB is an independent government investigative agency responsible for civil transportation accident investigation.

On Wednesday evening, an American Airlines passenger plane and a US Army Black Hawk helicopter collided in mid-air near the airport.

The aircraft, carrying 60 passengers and four crew members, was en route from Kansas. The helicopter, which was on a training flight, had three military personnel on board.

Both aircraft crashed into the Potomac River.

No survivors

US President Donald Trump confirmed Thursday that no one survived the crash.

Trump said officials do not yet know what led to the crash late Wednesday of American Airlines Flight 5342 and an Army Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan National Airport, but said, “We have some very strong opinions and ideas.”

“We think we have some pretty good ideas, but we’ll find out how this disaster occurred, and we’ll ensure that nothing like this ever happens again. The FAA and the NTSB and the US military will be carrying out a systematic and comprehensive investigation,” he said, referring to the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board.

Even as the investigation remains ongoing, Trump appeared to place blame on the crew of the military helicopter, saying, “You had a pilot problem from the standpoint of the helicopter.”

“It was very clear night, it was cold, but clear as you could be. The American Airlines plane had lights blazing, they had all their landing lights on,” he said. “You had a helicopter that had the ability to stop. I have helicopters. You can stop a helicopter very quickly. It had the ability to go up or down. It had the ability to turn. And the turn it made was not the correct turn, obviously. And it did, somewhat, the opposite of what it was told. We don’t know that would have been the difference.”

Trump was appearing to reference instructions given by air traffic controllers at Reagan National, whom he later said he was not blaming for the tragic accident.

“I’m saying there are things that you could question, like the height of the helicopter, the height of the plane being at the same level going in opposite directions. It’s not a positive,” he said. It is not immediately clear to what Trump was referring.

The president confirmed that Russians are among the foreign nationals killed in the crash, saying there were “a couple of others” from other countries among the dead. Trump said the US would work to facilitate the return of remains of the Russian nationals despite the fact that there are no direct flights between the US and Russia.

Homendy said the agency will allow first responders to do a recovery mission before starting an investigation into the mid-air collision.

She said Thursday is the first day for the board to have a full crew on the scene, adding that “we allow the responders to do their important safety mission, which in this case was search and rescue and recovery. We stand back to allow them to do their important safety mission.”

Homendy also requested some time for the agency to verify the facts as it works to probe the cause of the collision.

“It’s not that we don’t have information. We do have information, we have data. We have substantial amounts of information. We need to verify information. We need to take our time to make sure it is accurate,” she added.

Stating that the agency will look at the “human, machine and the environment” to determine the cause of the collision, Homendy said: “We will look at all the humans that were involved in this accident.”

Preliminary report within 30 days

Board member Todd Inman said the agency’s goal is to issue a preliminary report on the cause of the collision within 30 days.

“Our investigative team will be on scene as long as it takes in order to obtain all of the perishable evidence and all of the fact-finding that is needed to bring us to a conclusion of probable cause,” he said.

He noted that the plane had a “very quick” and “rapid impact” in the aftermath of the crash.

“Right now, we’re going through the debris fields. Nothing we’ve seen would indicate that maybe slides or shoots were deployed,” he added.

Inman also said the authorities have not yet recovered any of the boxes from the aircraft.

“We will probably have more than one black box, so to speak. It’s our understanding that the Sikorsky helicopter is equipped with some form of recording devices,” he said.