Better late than never, I guess? Army suspends Pentagon helicopter flights, at last Politico reports how the Army has today suspended helicopter flights into the Pentagon, near Washington National Airport (DCA). This suspension impacts helicopter operations out of the 12th Aviation Battalion, which is tasked with evacuating political VIPs in the event of an emergency.…
Continue reading: Overdue: Army Suspends Helicopter Flights Near DCA
Share your questions, experiences, and thoughts below.
Nobody. The potential scapegoats are dead and politicians care more about the convenience of DCA today than any future risk to themselves or the traveling public.
I am flying AA today and the option was to connect at DCA or CLT to head to MSP…. DCA was better timed. But nope. My somewhat irrational self chose CLT.
Certainly NOT the people who kept passing her on previous checkrides, or anybody in the Biden Administration who made phone calls to the 12thBN telling them to do it or the people who electronically wiped her from the face of the Earth.
It is only a bipartisan issue because many of those in Congress fly in and out of DCA.
Could this serious incident spell the end to DEI in the U.S. military?
Could inclusion on merit be restored in the U.S.?
Could this spell the end of the WOKE indoctrination in the U.S.?
Could you stop going on about DEI with absolutely no evidence? Could you stop with saying “woke” which has absolutely no definition aside from “things and people I don’t like”.
Fastest way to die ... standing between Ted Cruz and a news camera ... encouraging the FAA “to act swiftly and assert control over the national airspace so the Army stops running air taxis for military officials near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.” --- Wouldn't it be a lot quicker to ask the Army to stop doing it?" Did Ted try that, was told to go pound sand. (in Mexico ...)
Re: the paragraph about Duffy being confused about the purpose of the flights. I disagree, I think he's mostly right. The DoD mostly flies around there for two reasons: training flights for evacuation scenarios, and shuttling VIPs who don't want to deal with DC traffic to/from the Pentagon. I'd bet there are more of the latter than the former, which is what I understood Sec. Duffy to be saying.
As for the evacuation training flights, I don't think they need to be run that often. And it seems a reasonable compromise would be to do them between 1 AM and 5 AM when there are no scheduled landings/takeoffs.
I am wondering why the Blackhawks of this unit are suddenly struggling to integrate with the local traffic pattern. Perhaps getting rid of those PoC has reduced the quality of the flight personnel?
In the actual event of an emergency VIP evacuation from the Pentagon, traffic into DCA would just be diverted. Using night vision goggles or anything that restricted special awareness in such a tight airspace never, ever made any sense
James, James, could you please explain to all readers why one should STOP asking questions about factors which could have contributed to the subject serious incident?
Could the questions be related and therefore embarrassing to the U.S. military?
Some military authorities invest heavily in NVG training for both rotary and fixed wing aircrews. Such training would never be carried out in such a congested airspace. Only fully qualified and experienced pilots would be allowed to operate in such a potentially hostile environment.
One is not trying to suggest that the lack of appropriate training was a contributing cause of subject serious incident, only the incident investigators can determine that.