BREAKING: FAA report reveals staffing at Reagan National was ‘not normal’ at time of crash

The internal safety report, reviewed by the New York Times, stated that the number of staff at Reagan National Airport’s air traffic control tower was "not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic." The controller in the tower Wednesday evening was handling both helicopters in the airport’s vicinity as well as instructing planes that were departing from and landing on the airport’s runways. The outlet noted that those jobs are typically assigned to two controllers.

The tower at DC’s closest airport has reportedly been understaffed for years, being nearly a third below targeted staff levels as of September 2023, with 19 fully certified controllers. Many controllers have had to work up to six days per week and 10 hours per day.

A May 2024 report from CNN stated that air traffic control stations across the country were around 3,000 controllers short at the time. In the 2023 fiscal year, the FAA hired around 1,512 new controller candidates but lost 1,300 employees during the same timeframe, which included retired employees or candidates who dropped out of training. Around 400 people failed the FAA’s academy and another 109 who had been farther along in training dropped out.

Former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg in 2023 lamented air traffic control shortages in New York, calling it "unacceptable," per Reuters. This came as the FAA extended cuts to its minimum flight requirements at area airports over staffing shortages, with the New York Terminal Radar Approach Control staffing sitting at just 54 percent of recommended staffing at the time.

Just before 9 pm on Wednesday, American Airlines flight 5342 was approaching Reagan National’s runway 33 when the plane collided with a Black Hawk helicopter from the 12th Aviation Battalion at Fort Belvoir which was on a training flight over the Potomac River. Video captured a fireball in the sky when the collision occurred. The helicopter had been in the air for just nine minutes, while the airplane was nearing the conclusion of its flight from Wichita, Kansas. Three people were aboard the helicopter while 64 passengers and crew were aboard the American Airlines flight.

Fire officials said on Thursday morning that rescue operations were shifting to recover operations, as they no longer believe there are any survivors.

In a Thursday afternoon press conference, Trump said, "The FAA’s website states they include hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability and dwarfism, all qualify for the position of a controller of airplanes pouring into our country, pouring into a little spot on the map."

He added, "The people in the helicopter should have seen where they were going. I can’t imagine people with 20/20 vision not seeing what’s happening up there. They shouldn’t have been at the same height."

Trump assured the American public that "Flying is very safe. We have the safest flying anywhere in the world and we’ll keep it that way," and said, "I’d not hesitate to fly. This is something that, it’s been many years, something like this has happened. The collision is just something that we don’t expect ever to happen again."

The identities of victims began to come out on Thursday, which included members of the Skating Club of Boston, multiple former students of Loudon County Public Schools, captain of the flight Jonathan Campos and pilot Samuel Lilley, the latter of which was freshly engaged, and flight attendants Ian Epstein and Danasia Elder.

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