The heroic pilots of the doomed American Airlines jet that collided with a US Army helicopter in Washington DC this week made a desperate attempt to save their passengers, but tragically, it was too late.
The American Airlines flight from Wichita, Kansas, was carrying 64 passengers when it collided with an Army Black Hawk helicopter on the evening of Wednesday January 29, leaving no survivors.
The pilots’ haunting final words were also captured. “That is something that we will get you more detail on”. As investigators delve deeper, they’ve found conflicting readings on the altitudes of the airliner and helicopter at the time of the collision.
Preliminary data from the plane’s data recorder reveals that the pilots pulled the nose up just seconds before impact, in the worst US aviation disaster in nearly 25 years, which claimed 67 lives as the plane approached Ronald Reagan Airport.
The AA5342’s flight recorder showed an altitude of 325 feet, give or take 25 feet, while the control tower data put the Black Hawk helicopter at 200 feet. The discrepancy remains unexplained.
Investigators are working to reconcile the altitude differences using data from the helicopter’s black box, which was waterlogged and is taking longer to retrieve. They also plan to refine the tower data, which can be less reliable, reports the Express US.
“That’s what our job is, to figure that out,” said NTSB member Todd Inman, acknowledging that there was disagreement within the investigative team about whether to release the information or wait for more data.
In the tragic incident, an American Airlines flight from Wichita, Kansas, carrying 64 passengers collided with an Army Black Hawk helicopter over the Potomac River, leaving no survivors.
The Bombardier jet was preparing to land just across the river from the nation’s capital when it hit the military helicopter that had apparently strayed into its path.
“This is a complex investigation. There are a lot of pieces here. Our team is working hard to gather this data,” said Brice Banning, NTSB investigator in charge.
So far, the remains of 42 people have been retrieved from the river, including 38 that have been positively identified, according to Washington emergency officials.
They anticipate recovering all of the remains. However, the twisted wreckage has made the recovery effort particularly challenging for dive teams, who have struggled to access parts of the plane’s fuselage.
These sections will need to be removed to retrieve the remaining bodies, stated DC Fire and EMS Chief John Donnelly.
David Hoagland, president of the Washington, DC, Firefighters Local 36 said: “Things have kind of slowed down this weekend because they’re waiting on a lot more heavier salvage equipment that’s going to be showing up sometime in the next 24 to 36 hours.
“They’re going to be setting up for a pretty complicated operation where they’re going to be removing plane parts from the water on Monday.”
According to Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy, the jet’s wreckage broke apart. The fuselage was discovered upside down in three sections in the river, which is about eight feet deep in some areas.
Divers have been utilising specialised underwater hydraulic rescue tools capable of cutting metal to recover as many victims as possible, added Hoagland.