Close call with passenger jet happened after Army helicopter tried to land without clearance, preliminary report confirms
Story by Alexandra Skores, Pete Muntean, CNN • 14h
A Pentagon-bound Army helicopter that got less than half a mile from a commercial flight landing at nearby Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in May did not have the proper clearance from Pentagon air traffic controllers, a preliminary report from the National Transportation Safety Board said Friday.
At their closest, the Black Hawk helicopter and landing Delta Air Lines regional jet were only four tenths of a mile apart and separated by just 200 feet of altitude, causing controllers in the airport tower to force the jet to abort its landing.
The helicopter was approaching the Pentagon from the southwest as three planes were preparing to land at Reagan National Airport, including an American Airlines regional jet arriving from Maine, a Delta flight from Orlando and the Delta regional jet from Boston involved in the close call.
The report said the Black Hawk pilots coordinated their landing plans with the air traffic control tower at Reagan National Airport—which made for space for the helicopter between the American and later Delta flight—but controllers from a different air traffic control facility slotted the other Delta plane into that gap.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/close-call-with-passenger-jet-happened-after-army-helicopter-tried-to-land-without-clearance-preliminary-report-confirms/ar-AA1L3b7B?ocid=msedgdhp&pc=HCTS&cvid=68f756c8268d43c9a287c11bd4175370&ei=13
