The Potomac River Midair Collision

My nephew's wife died in that crash. Only 26, and already a widower.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/husband-pa...

I spent three and a half hours reading the report. It’s well worth a read. It’s scary; I was aware of the Swiss cheese analogy in aviation safety, so it was scary to read how so many people were raising red flags, but due to either ignorance or politics these red flags were ignored; like people were complaining about the size of holes in the Swiss cheese so much but no real action took place.

The chapter about the rot in the machine made me especially worried. I now have serious doubts about the readiness of our armed forces.

It's strangely meditative to read the prose of someone who was so willing to absorb every single fact about something and to have a considered opinion on each of them. It is a strange type of mind to interact with. I feel slightly cleansed somehow.

I’ve read NTSB reports before. Studied aviation accidents as a hobby to help me overcome a sudden and irrational fear of flying (thanks Final Destination!).

I’m on Chapter 4, and this is, by far the best report I’ve ever read. Each section addressed in depth, historical context included because it’s important rather than omitted as being technically irrelevant. Dirty laundry splayed out on a blank canvas for the viewer to observe, digest, and reflect upon.

Not since the DC-10 have I been so incensed at an institution for its pettiness, personal vanity, and bureaucracy as I am with Congress, the FAA, the NTSB, and the DoD right now.

Pilot here (small / private airplanes, for about 15 years now, instrument rated but that's it).

1. "See and avoid" is BS, always has been, always will be. ADS-B was supposed to end the reliance on it, but the FAA almost immediately started poking holes in it once it was deemed successful by the companies in Alaska that tested it. Good controllers and TCAS stop this stuff from happening all the time despite the FAA's poor decisions.

2. The few near misses I've personally experienced have been due to inaction, as described in the article. In fairness there are a lot of buttons, knobs, dials, and screens to look after. A slowly developing unsafe situation isn't always at the front of one's mind. But if it doesn't feel right, you gotta say something. Especially if you are in a helicopter and you can just stop. There's no excuse for them continuing ahead without better awareness of their surroundings than they had, when they can just stop.

ex: a new'ish controller let me (in a low wing airplane, descending) get too close to another (high wing airplane, climbing) near Little Rock, AR some years ago. I was flying IFR so I was bound to follow their instructions, which were to fly direct to a waypoint and cross it at a lower altitude. The high wing airplane was not talking to the controller, they were flying visually (likely a student and instructor, they were climbing out of an airport with a lot of flight school activity).

The new guy controller gave me location and trajectory on the high wing airplane twice. After the second such call I told him that I cannot see this traffic below me through my wings, you need to give me a turn. The supervisor took over when I insisted, and gave me a turn and new heading. It didn't dawn on the new controller that the *types* of aircraft involved were what made it dangerous, neither of us can see through our wings so we weren't going to find each other visually. It did dawn on the supervisor when I spoke up to the new guy, who recognized the situation and handled it.

He apologized for the new guy and offered the phone number as he took my flight plan cancellation, I declined. "Not necessary, we're all okay, you handle it. I don't need to put any marks on anyone's chart." That's how it's all supposed to work. "Doing nothing" like the helicopter did in this crash did not allow for that possible safe outcome.

tl;dr: Someone has to take initiative. If the controller doesn't, the pilot should demand instructions from the controller. Flying dangerous machines isn't for tentative / indecisive people.

Well worth reading and I appreciated the PDF to print out.

I have just finished chapter 2.

About congress overriding safety concerns for their personal convenience

Air traffic controllers' concerns were shutdown by the FAA because of "politics"

I am gobsmacked. Where was the air traffic controllers' union? They could have used industrial action to address the unsafe conditions

I am yet to finish the document. I am expecting to see the ATCs and the pilots blamed by the authorities, I hope not.

6 submissions, 4 comments, and a combined 24 upvotes so far:

https://news.ycombinator.com/from?site=admiralcloudberg.medi...

Keep trying, folks. This one is worth it.

EDIT:

> Note that this is a long article (~3 hour read). If you just want the executive summary of what happened, I might suggest skipping forward to chapter 7 first and then if you want more, go back and read the in-depth analysis of earlier chapters. [HN user kraussvonespy 2 days ago]

- Which doesn't mention that the first 6 para's of Chapter 7 are an excellent tl;dr; of the previous 6 chapters. And definitely understates both the detail and quality of the balance of Chapter 7 (the minute-by-minute details leading up to the crash).

[dead]

TL;DR: Because of her position and the difficulty of acquiring experience, Captain Lobach only had 454 total flying hours at the time of the accident, of which 326 were on the UH-60. She had flown only 56 hours in the past year,[1:12] below the already inadequate minimum of 60 for non-line pilots, due to a knee injury that kept her off the flight line for three months in 2024.[41] And in the two months before the accident flight, she had only flown for 4.4 hours,[1:12] in part because she forewent flying duties during the month of December in order to support her White House liaison role.[40:52–53] Taken in total, then, it cannot be said that Lobach was an experienced pilot; in fact, quite the opposite was true. With 454 hours, she would be ineligible to apply for a First Officer position at a commercial airline in the United States, and even in countries where airlines can hire First Officers right out of flight school with 250 hours, she would have been considered a rookie. [Note: To understand the scale: think of Captain Peter "Maverick" Mitchell in the movie.]

I tried to read it. Section list isn’t links. Tried to scroll, got a full screen dickbox. Gave up.

If you want to write for email, just write for email and don’t put it on the web. If you wanna put it on the web, use web features.

And either way, don’t put full screen stuff in my face when I’m trying to read.

I gave up. I’ll wait for a summary from another website that treats users better.