by Jacob Fischler, Florida Phoenix
March 27, 2025

The U.S. Army and Federal Aviation Administration continued to allow some flights to operate near a Washington, D.C.-area airport with a location communications system turned off, even after the absence of that system contributed to the January midair collision that killed 67 people, officials testified at a U.S. Senate panel hearing Thursday.

Acting FAA Administrator Chris Rocheleau told the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Aviation, Space and Innovation Subcommittee that he was ordering all flights in the airspace of Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport operate with a certain aircraft tracking system.

But until Thursday, no such order was in place, Rocheleau said, to the dismay of some leading committee members.

The system, known as Automatic Dependent Surveillance–Broadcast, or ADS-B, automatically broadcasts once per second an aircraft’s location to other nearby pilots. The system from broadcasting outgoing signals is called ADS-B out, and the ability to receive the signals is called ADS-B in.

The U.S. Army continues to allow flights with ADS-B turned off, even in the area around the Virginia-based airport that serves the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia, also known as DCA, U.S. Army Brigadier Gen. Matthew Braman, the director of Army aviation, told the panel.

“I have to say I find that shocking and deeply unacceptable,” Sen. Ted Cruz, a Texas Republican who chairs the full committee, told Braman.

“And I want to encourage the Army right now to revisit that policy and revisit that policy today,” Cruz continued. “If the Army chooses not to, I have a high level of confidence that Congress will pass legislation mandating that you revisit the policy. If today another accident occurs over DCA with another helicopter that had ADS-B out turned off, the Army will have very direct responsibility, and I am at a loss to come up with any justification for risking the lives of the traveling public with that decision.”

Rocheleau said he was putting in place a requirement Thursday to require all flights near DCA, including military flights, to have ADS-B turned on.

ADS-B is considered much more accurate than traditional radar, which broadcasts once every four to six seconds, National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy said.

The full committee’s ranking Democrat, Maria Cantwell of Washington, appeared not to know in advance Rocheleau was planning to issue the requirement and questioned his handling of the issue.

“Acting administrator, you’re not building faith in this system of oversight of the FAA,” she said.

She noted several government agencies and departments, including the Department of Homeland Security, had applied for exemptions to be allowed to keep their safety systems off.

Rocheleau said the FAA had a memorandum of understanding with other federal airspace users that they must use the safety system, though Cantwell noted that was not legally enforceable.

‘Intolerable risk’

Several factors contributed to the deadly Jan. 29 collision of an Army Black Hawk helicopter with an American Airlines commercial jet over the Potomac River, Homendy said. Sixty-four people on the regional jet died, along with three in the Black Hawk.

But the helicopter’s approved flight path that left no margin for error presented an “intolerable risk to aviation safety,” she said.

Subcommittee Chairman Jerry Moran, a Kansas Republican, said the FAA ignored warning signs for years.

Over a 13-year span, there was not a single month that did not include a “close call” between a helicopter and a commercial jet operating at DCA, Moran said.

He added that in just more than three years, from October 2021 to December 2024, there were 15,000 “close proximity events” between a helicopter and a commercial jet.

“I want to know how, with these statistics in the FAA files, why, prior to Jan. 29 the agency failed to improve safety protocols at Reagan National Airport,” he said.

The American Airlines flight attempting to land at DCA departed from Wichita, Kansas, and Moran opened the hearing with an acknowledgment of the lives lost.

“Sixty-seven lives that were lost on Jan. 29 were taken prematurely in an accident that, by all indications, should have been avoided,” he said.

The collision was the first disaster of President Donald Trump’s second term and came just two days after the Senate confirmed former Wisconsin Rep. Sean Duffy as Transportation secretary.

It was the deadliest plane crash in the Washington area since 1982, when an Air Florida flight crashed into the Potomac River and killed 78 people.

Transparency

Homendy also told the panel her agency had trouble procuring records and even basic information from an FAA-led working group on helicopter safety in the D.C. area.

The Army is also a member of that working group, Braman said.

“Can I please say there is a D.C. helicopter working group that we have been trying to figure out who is part of the working group and get minutes and get documents from that working group to see what information was shared and what was discussed over the years, and we have not been able to attain that yet,” Homendy said.

She added she wanted to review how the flight plan was approved.

Rocheleau said he would work to figure out why the NTSB has had issues with the records.

In a statement, the law firm representing some families of those killed in the crash, called for more transparency from the agencies involved.

Rocheleau and Braman “were less than forthcoming to the American public and did their best to obfuscate the information provided to the committee,” the statement from Clifford Law Offices read. “They failed to accept responsibility and accountability for this needless tragedy and the thousands of other adverse experiences that could have led to additional disasters.”

Last updated 4:29 p.m., Mar. 27, 2025

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