FOX Business’ Grady Trimble speaks with National Transportation Safety Board member Todd Inman about the ongoing investigation to discover the cause of the tragic D.C. plane crash.
Following a bombshell report over the alleged air traffic control staffing on the night of the tragic American Airlines and Black Hawk helicopter collision in D.C., the National Transportation Safety Board’s (NTSB) designated spokesperson for the incident warned that “a lot of questions remain” about the events leading up to the crash.
“Let me say this first: we [have] to remember 67 people lost their lives… Today will be yet another day of the teams going out there,” NTSB member Todd Inman told FOX Business’ Grady Trimble on Friday.
“They’re out in the field. They’re collecting data. They’ve started interviews. We have hundreds of people in this investigation,” he continued. “But the most important thing right now is to obtain and preserve any perishable evidence so that whenever we come off scene, we can start the analyzation of it.”
An internal preliminary report from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), obtained by the Associated Press, allegedly showed that the number of staff members working at the air control tower at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) in Arlington, Virginia, was “not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic.”
EXPERT PUTS ONUS ON F.A.A. FOR AMERICAN AIRLINES, HELICOPTER CRASH: ‘BAD MANAGEMENT’ IS ‘PUTTING US AT RISK’
On Wednesday night, an American Airlines plane and an Army helicopter collided near Reagan National Airport outside of Washington, D.C. All 67 people onboard both aircraft are presumed dead.
NTSB member Todd Inman told FOX Business “we don’t use the word normal per say,” when discussing air traffic control staff. (Getty Images)
“We don’t use the word normal per se,” Inman reacted. “What happens immediately after an accident is a safety review team begins doing just what we said, perishable evidence. And this is a lot of different people from the FAA. Union representatives all immediately start gaining information.
“So what people are talking about is a rough draft of something, but it is a small piece of a very big puzzle. Thousands of data points,” he added. “So ultimately [it led] to our recommendation of how to prevent this tragedy from occurring again.”
The FAA report also claimed that one air traffic controller was working two positions at the time of the crash, when typically, the two assignments are split between two air traffic controllers.
Aviation expert Captain Mike Coffield breaks down the response process and investigation following a midair collision between a regional airline jet and an Army Black Hawk helicopter.
“Airports are living, breathing cities. So at any time because of weather, because of traffic, because of any other issue, you could see fluctuations in staff up and down. Now, is that an acceptable standard for safety? We will investigate that, and we’re going to find out. If there was anything that needs to be remediated, [we] will then make recommendations,” Inman responded.
Inman pointed out that the NTSB will be closely evaluating evidence like cockpit communications, unique sound recordings, aileron positions, landing gear, altitude pitch, submerged electronics, debris and even interviewing staff that were working with both aircraft.
President Donald Trump has also chimed in on the investigation, claiming via Truth Social that the Army helicopter may have been flying too high, “far above the 200 foot limit” in the DCA airspace.
Victims identified in DC plane crash involving American Airlines jet and military helicopter (Getty Images / Getty Images)
“I would be very careful to anyone who’s listening to this to rely upon off-the-shelf software speculation they’re seeing online,” Inman noted. “Our job is to get the absolute facts as we get these [black] boxes in and get them analyzed, and we look at more granular data, [we’ll] be able to give a much better picture on that.
“In fact, I would just make sure you remember there can be a 50-foot difference in some cases and up to 100 yards for radar versus Ads-b, which is more GPS based. But it’s still not as accurate as what’s in the plane itself.”
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Helicopter pilot Dean Wegner argues there’s ‘a longer story’ behind the tragic American Airlines and helicopter aircraft collision and shares his condolences.
The NTSB plans to “take [their] time” on the investigation, pledging to follow through all evidence “as long as it takes” to get to the root of what happened Wednesday night.
“We’ve done over 100,000 aviation accident investigations, made 15,000 recommendations,” Inman said. “Right now, we’ve not found anything. But if we do, we will immediately tell the public. Our job is to prevent this tragedy from happening again.”
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Fox News’ Greg Wehner contributed to this report.
