Washington: The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said on Friday it is imposing permanent restrictions on non-essential helicopter operations around the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport and eliminating helicopter and passenger jet mixed traffic, following recommendations from the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB).
The FAA’s latest rules came over a month after the fatal collision between a Black Hawk helicopter and a passenger jet near the airport on Jan. 29, which killed 67 people.
“The FAA is taking a series of steps to improve safety around Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport (DCA) that follows the NTSB’s recommendations,” the FAA said in a statement.
The FAA is permanently closing Route 4 – one key helicopter route and “evaluating alternative helicopter routes” as recommended by the NTSB, which is leading the investigation.
The FAA is “prohibiting the simultaneous use” of Runways 15/33 and 4/22 when helicopters conducting urgent missions are operating near DCA.
It is also limiting the use of “visual separation” to certain Coast Guard, Marine and Park Police helicopter operations outside the restricted airspace. Visual separation is a standard procedure where pilots are responsible for ensuring safe distances from other aircraft by visually observing them, rather than relying solely on radar separation.
Before the deadly collision, the Black Hawk pilot requested visual separation and was granted by air traffic controller.
In an update in mid-February, the NTSB said that investigations suggest that there may have been communication misunderstandings, possibly due to radio transmission issues, which could have contributed to the collision.
After the crash, the FAA temporarily barred most helicopters near the airport.
On Tuesday, the NTSB urgently recommended that the FAA permanently prohibit helicopter operations near the airport, when certain runways are in use for arrivals or departures, calling it “an intolerable risk to aviation safety by increasing the chance of a midair collision.”
In its 10-page urgent recommendation report, the NTSB said that helicopters transiting the Route 4 helicopter corridor at the maximum authorized altitude of 200 feet (roughly 61 meters) could have only about 75 feet (roughly 23 meters) of vertical separation from an airplane on landing approach to Runway 33, calling it “insufficient.”
Review of information gathered from voluntary safety reporting programs along with FAA data regarding encounters between helicopters and commercial aircraft near DCA from 2011 through 2024 indicated that “a vast majority of the reported events occurred on approach to landing,” the report said.
Initial analysis found that since 2011, at least one traffic collision avoidance system (TCAS) resolution advisory was triggered per month due to proximity to a helicopter. In over half of these instances, the helicopter may have been above the route altitude restriction. Two-thirds of the events occurred at night.
NTSB said earlier that the radio altitude of the Black Hawk at the time of the collision was 278 feet (roughly 85 meters). The maximum altitudes along Helicopter Route One — the route the Black Hawk helicopter was on — vary depending on the location, but are 200 feet (approximately 61 meters) just south of Memorial Bridge, where the collision occurred.
