American Airlines plane, helicopter collide in midair near D.C. : NPR

Lights from emergency vehicles flash Wednesday night at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Arlington, Va., following a midair collision involving an American Airline flight and a helicopter.

Ting Shen/AFP via Getty Images

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Ting Shen/AFP via Getty Images

An American Airlines passenger jet and a helicopter collided Wednesday night near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport outside the nation’s capital, according to the Federal Aviation Administration.

“A PSA Airlines Bombardier CRJ700 regional jet collided in midair with a Sikorsky H-60 helicopter while on approach to Runway 33 at Reagan Washington National Airport around 9 p.m. local time,” the preliminary statement read. It added that Flight 5342 had taken off from Wichita, Kan.

Surveillance video from the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., shows a small aircraft, presumably the helicopter, colliding with the passenger jet at a low altitude followed by a bright explosion. Radar tracking sites show the passenger jet appears to have fallen into the frigid Potomac River.

“Small aircraft down in Potomac River vicinity Reagan National Airport. Fireboats on scene,” the DC Fire and EMS Department posted on X.

A Bombardier CRJ-700 has a maximum capacity of 70 people. It has two pilots and typically two flight attendants.

Airport officials say that all takeoffs and landings have been halted. In a post on Xthe airport said emergency personnel are “responding to an aircraft incident on the airfield.”

The National Transportation Safety Board and the FAA are both investigating.

The airspace in and around Reagan Washington National is complicated due to challenging approaches into the airport as well as flight restrictions above government buildings. It’s also a particularly busy airspace, with an influx of police and military helicopters operating in the area.

The last major commercial airplane accident involving a U.S. passenger plane was in 2009 when a Colgan Air flight crashed near Buffalo killing a total of 50 people (49 passengers and crew, and one person inside a house).