Recent Warnings and Dangerous Conditions at National

• • • 1/20: Trump sworn in

    • 1/20: FAA chief leaves after Musk demands he resigns  because of $650K penalty for safety violatiuons at SpaceX 

    •  1/21: Air Traffic Controller hiring Freeze 

    •  1/22: Aviation Safety Advisory Committee disbanded 

    •  1/29: First American mid-air collision in 16 years 

    •  1/30 Trump administration cites DEI for crash and orders review at FAA

    • 2/26 American flight from Boston aborts landing to avoid a departing aircraft at National 

    •  3/11 NTSB forces FAA to finally take action to ban helicopters from interfering with flight paths New NTSB Rules

      • Investigators uncovered 15,214 “near miss events” between 2021 and 2024 where aircraft were within one nautical mile of colliding, with a vertical separation of less than 400 feet. Additionally, there were also 85 cases where two aircraft were separated by less than 1,500 feet, with a vertical separation of less than 200 feet, according to the NTSB. 

    •  3/27 Insightful comments from FAA Administrator about deadly crash "something was missed" (Really?)

    • 3/28 Near miss between Delta and Military aircraft

    • 3/30 FAA reports 30 near misses at DCA since 1987 of which 10 involved helicopters 

    • 3/30 United flight strikes kite

    • 3/31 Fight Club - Air traffic controller arrested for assualting colleague chaos in the control tower

    • 4/2 FAA to provided intervention and health care services to air traffic controllers crisis intervention for controllers? 

    • 4/8 Federal investigation indicates more civilian aircrarft near misses during  military flyovers  

    • 4/9 Transgender pilot sues influencer for making claims she flew Black Hawk in DC crash Matt Wallace/Trump DEI 

    • 4/10 Two American Airlines jets clip wings on ground at Reagan airport Six members of Congress on board wet pants 

    • 4/27 Misteps, faulty operational procedures, and failures contributed to January 29 crash - NY Times 

    • 5/2 Another miss with Pentagon helicopter doing a "scenic tour"  joy riding generals 

    • 5/7  Last March, the FAA banned helicopters near National Airport. They are disrupting flights anyway.  Washington Post 

    • 5/14 - Air traffic hotline connecting Pentagon and Reagan National inoperable for past 3 years BBC 

    • 5/23 - Pentagon lost contact with its military helicopter involved in the 5/2 near miss - NBC - local 

Other Events and Issues

• Air traffic control communications breakdown Near-collision investigation reveals Reagan Nationalconnecting Airport controllers failed to stop flights during military flyover 

• <NEW> DCA fight club! 

  • Chaos in the control tower 

  • Crisis intervention for controllers? 

• Are you scared yet? GPS hacking 

• New FAA administrator making the skies more dangerous Politico 

• Great article from AXIOS - "Why Congress can add flights to D.C.'s busiest airport" 

• Read 1/30 article From Democracynow

• Nightmare at Newark Airport

  • May 5 - Chaos for controllers from complete failure of systems 

  • May 5 - United cuts 35 flights cites safety concerns 

  • May 7 - Update on Newark delays passengers suffer 

  • May 7 - Controllers take trauma leave because of communication failures 

  • May 7 - FAA promises upgrades admits crisis 

  • May 8 - Warning from controllers frequent equipment outage 

  • May 8 - What caused the failures many  long-term issues ignore

  • May 9 - Deju Vu all over again Another radar and communications failure 

  • May 9 - No short-term solution to problems these will persist 

  • May 13 - United CEO blames traumitized air traffic controllers for ongoing problems at Newark; Tim Arel, head of the FAA’s Air Traffic Organization, and Kelvin Coleman, head of Commercial Space Transportation resign

  • May 17 - United cuts Newark arriving and departing flights by 30% from 40 to 28 flights 

  • June 1 - Runway under construction at Newark reopens - expected to ease congestion