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Conditions May Have Stymied Black Hawk Crew Before Fatal Crash
Flying helicopters near Ronald Reagan National Airport always carries some risk. But the conditions on the moonless night of Jan. 29, when an Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines passenger jet collided, were unusually challenging.
Many of the factors that contributed to the disaster are still being uncovered as investigators from the National Transportation Safety Board try to reconstruct the collision that killed 67 people. The midair crash, which caused wreckage from both aircraft to tumble into the icy Potomac River below, was the nation’s deadliest aviation accident since 2009.
Investigators have said the helicopter was flying about 100 feet higher than authorized in its designated portion of the airspace and are trying to determine why.
But interviews with helicopter pilots suggest that the Black Hawk was also dealing with a set of complex flying conditions, some of which are typical for the bustling area around National Airport outside Washington and some of which were unique to the series of events that happened last Wednesday. And the crew was flying an older-model aircraft that lacked certain safety technologies in its cockpit that are commonplace in those of commercial airplanes in the United States.
“Given the complexity of everything going on there, it is a higher-risk place to fly,” said Austin Roth, a former Black Hawk instructor for the Army who says he often flew the helicopter routes near National Airport while in service.
N.T.S.B. safety investigators have not assessed any blame on the Black Hawk crew, which Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth described as “fairly experienced.”
The safety agency said on Tuesday that there was still information that needed to be collected from the helicopter, a process that is expected to begin this week when its wreckage is lifted from the Potomac. Investigators said the two aircraft collided at 300 feet — a detail that has raised questions about how the helicopter got off course, given that it was not authorized to fly higher than 200 feet above ground.
The New York Times, through interviews with six current and former military aviators and a civilian helicopter pilot who frequently flies the routes near National Airport, has pieced together some understanding of the conditions that the crew faced the night of the crash.
The crew in the UH-60 Black Hawk left its home base, Fort Belvoir in Virginia, after dark last Wednesday to conduct a training mission to allow the co-pilot, Capt. Rebecca Lobach, to perform a required annual evaluation flight.
It was part of the small group of military and civilian law enforcement helicopters authorized to fly in the highly restricted airspace over Washington and Northern Virginia. Those pilots must fly along designated routes that generally follow the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers. The air traffic controllers inside the tower at National Airport manage that airspace for helicopters and planes alike.
These routes specify certain altitude restrictions for helicopters along the water, including Route 4, the one that prohibits flying higher than 200 feet over the stretch of the Potomac where the collision occurred.
That restriction, according to several of the pilots, provides little room to maneuver in case of an emergency. At such a low altitude over a river, moving up — not down — is the more realistic response.
Mr. Roth said there are helicopter routes at Dulles International Airport and Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport that allow pilots to fly over the commercial jet airspace rather than through it, which gives pilots more options in the event of an emergency.
“I can’t think of anywhere where you can fly next to a major airport at 200 feet,” said Mr. Roth, who was in the same unit as the crew of the helicopter that crashed. A combination of dark skies and surrounding city lights — lights that would have been amplified exponentially if the crew members were wearing night-vision goggles — may have distracted them as they searched for nearby air traffic.
“So they’re flying over a black water surface of the Potomac with ground clutter and the buildings behind them,” said Senator Tammy Duckworth, the Illinois Democrat who flew Black Hawk helicopters during her military career.
At about 8:46 p.m. last Wednesday, an air traffic controller warned the helicopter crew that a passenger jet was nearby. That plane, American Airlines Flight 5342, had been redirected from Runway 1, which regional jets commonly used, to the lesser-used Runway 33.
Captain Lobach was most likely in the right-hand seat, said a senior Army official who has flown the National Airport helicopter routes repeatedly but requested anonymity because he was not authorized to speak publicly.
This is significant, the official said, because if the instructor pilot was busy or distracted with something, Captain Lobach’s seat on the right side of the aircraft might have put her in poor position to view the descending American Airlines flight on her left.
Still, other experienced military pilots said they were puzzled at the crash, given that military pilots are trained to be ready for such hazards.
The Black Hawk, a twin-engine aircraft introduced in the 1970s that has inspired a variety of models, has long been a fixture in the U.S. military, both for general purposes and for more tailored missions. In the Army alone, about 2,000 Black Hawks are in operation today.
In the Washington area, which is home to the White House, the Pentagon and several air fields from which both training flights and the transport of the president and other senior officials often originate, Black Hawks are ubiquitous.
The 12th Aviation Battalion at Fort Belvoir flies two types of Black Hawks: the UH-60L, an old model, and the VH-60M, a newer one. The aircraft involved in the crash was the older model. It does not have the ability to let pilots fly on autopilot but it is not considered insufficient for the job, according to the senior Army official.
Regardless, the official said, the crew flying along the Potomac River would not have found autopilot helpful. Low-level flying, he said, requires constant attention to terrain, obstacles and routes.
The Black Hawks, even the older models, are not especially hard to operate, said current and former military aviators. But the congestion around National Airport, one of the country’s busiest public airspaces, requires particular adeptness and a willingness to hang back if necessary to let passenger jets take off or land safely.
“That aircraft was in the wrong place well before they were in the same literal airspace with the CRJ,” said Jon-Claud Nix, a former Marine Corps helicopter pilot, using the abbreviation for the jet that was involved in the collision.
Mr. Nix, who has reviewed the air traffic control recordings and other public details of the crash, added, “They just needed to hold off a little bit to properly identify or locate their correct traffic.”
He said that in the final moments before the crash, the Black Hawk crew was essentially on its own to avoid collision. That is because the crew, according to a recording of the air traffic control audio, had requested what is known as “visual separation,” which under aviation rules means the crew would search out nearby traffic on its own, without assistance from controllers.
And the older Black Hawk model the crew flew last Wednesday most likely did not have certain air-safety systems that are standard among U.S. passenger jets.
For example, it would not have had the Traffic Collision Avoidance System, nicknamed TCAS, which alerts pilots to the fact that their planes are dangerously close to other aircraft and can redirect pilots to quickly climb or descend if a crash seems imminent.
The pilots say one or all of these factors could have contributed to a tragic sequence of events.
“Especially on that route,” Mr. Roth said, “it’s 200 feet which is a low altitude. It’s in proximity to other aircraft. The lighting conditions are tough and there’s just not many places in the world where all of that is happening to anyone all at once.”
new video loaded: Why Your Paycheck Feels Smaller
By Ben Casselman, Nour Idriss, Sutton Raphael and Stephanie Swart
April 18, 2026
Nearly two years after actor Alec Baldwin was cleared of criminal charges in the “Rust” movie shooting death, a long simmering civil negligence case is inching toward a trial this fall.
On Friday, a Los Angeles Superior Court judge denied a summary judgment motion requested by the film producers Rust Movie Productions LLC, as well as actor-producer Baldwin and his firm El Dorado Pictures to dismiss the case.
During a hearing, Superior Court Judge Maurice Leiter set an Oct. 12 trial date.
The negligence suit was brought more than four years ago by Serge Svetnoy, who served as the chief lighting technician on the problem-plagued western film. Svetnoy was close friends with cinematographer Halyna Hutchins and held her in his arms as she lay dying on the floor of the New Mexico movie set. Baldwin’s firearm had discharged, launching a .45 caliber bullet, which struck and killed her.
The Bonanza Creek Ranch in Santa Fe, N.M. in 2021.
(Jae C. Hong / Associated Press)
Svetnoy was the first crew member of the ill-fated western to bring a lawsuit against the producers, alleging they were negligent in Hutchins’ October 2021 death. He maintains he has suffered trauma in the years since. In addition to negligence, his lawsuit also accuses the producers of intentional infliction of emotional distress.
Prosecutors dropped criminal charges against Baldwin, who has long maintained he was not responsible for Hutchins’ death.
“We are pleased with the Court’s decision denying the motions for summary judgment filed by Rust Movie Productions and Mr. Baldwin,” lawyers Gary Dordick and John Upton, who represent Svetnoy, said in a statement following the hearing. “He looks forward to finally having his day in court on this long-pending matter.”
The judge denied the defendants’ request to dismiss the negligence, emotional distress and punitive damages claims. One count directed at Baldwin, alleging assault, was dropped.
Svetnoy has said the bullet whizzed past his head and “narrowly missed him,” according to the gaffer’s suit.
Attorneys representing Baldwin and the producers were not immediately available for comment.
Svetnoy and Hutchins had been friends for more than five years and worked together on nine film productions. Both were immigrants from Ukraine, and they spent holidays together with their families.
On Oct. 21, 2021, he was helping prepare for an afternoon of filming in a wooden church on Bonanza Creek Ranch. Hutchins was conversing with Baldwin to set up a camera angle that Hutchins wanted to depict: a close-up image of the barrel of Baldwin’s revolver.
The day had been chaotic because Hutchins’ union camera crew had walked off the set to protest the lack of nearby housing and previous alleged safety violations with the firearms on the set.
Instead of postponing filming to resolve the labor dispute, producers pushed forward, crew members alleged.
New Mexico prosecutors prevailed in a criminal case against the armorer, Hannah Gutierrez, in March 2024. She served more than a year in a state women’s prison for her involuntary manslaughter conviction before being released last year.
Baldwin faced a similar charge, but the case against him unraveled spectacularly.
On the second day of his July 2024 trial, his criminal defense attorneys — Luke Nikas and Alex Spiro — presented evidence that prosecutors and sheriff’s deputies withheld evidence that may have helped his defense . The judge was furious, setting Baldwin free.
Variety first reported on Friday’s court action.
The highest gas prices in the country are making it tougher for some gig drivers to make a living.
Gas prices have shot up amid the war in the Middle East. On average, California gas prices are the most expensive in the United States, according to data from the American Automobile Assn. The average price of regular gas in California is almost $6. The national average is a little above $4.
While Uber and Lyft drivers have concocted clever ways to cut gas consumption, they say that without some relief they will be forced to leave the ride-hailing business.
John Mejia was already struggling to make money as a part-time Lyft driver when soaring gas prices made his side hustle even harder.
“Unfortunately, it’s the economics of paying less to drivers and gas prices,” he said. “It actually is pulling people out of the business.”
Guests at The Westin St. Francis hotel get into an Uber.
(Jess Lynn Goss / For The Times)
Gig work offers drivers the freedom to work for themselves and more flexibility, but being independent contractors also means they must shoulder unexpected costs.
Ride-sharing companies say they’re trying to help, but drivers say the gas relief comes with caveats. For now, drivers say they’re being pickier about what rides they accept, cutting hours and are looking at other ways to make money.
Mejia, who started driving for Lyft more than a decade ago, said in his early days, he would sometimes make $400 in three hours. Now it takes 12 hours to rake in $200.
The San Francisco Bay Area consultant is an active member of the California Gig Workers Union, so he knows he isn’t alone. California has more than 800,000 gig rideshare drivers, according to the group, which is affiliated with the Service Employees International Union.
On social media sites such as Reddit and Facebook, gig workers have posted about how the higher gas prices are eating into their earnings. Among the tricks they are suggesting: reducing the number of times the ignition is turned on or off, avoiding traffic, working in specific neighborhoods and at times with high demand and switching to electric vehicles.
Gig drivers usually have only seconds to decide whether to accept a ride on the app, but they have become more strategic about which rides and deliveries they accept.
That means they are more likely to sit back in their cars and wait for higher fares for quick pick-up and drop-off.
“I highly recommend the ‘decline and recline’ strategy, rejecting unprofitable rides until a better one appears,” wrote Sergio Avedian, a driver, in the popular blog the Rideshare Guy.
Pedestrians cross the street in front of a Lyft and Uber driver on Wednesday. High gas prices have made it hard for gig drivers to make a living, cutting into their profits.
(Jess Lynn Goss / For The Times)
Uber, Lyft and other companies have unveiled several ways to help drivers save on gas.
Uber said drivers can get up to 15% cash back through May 26 with the Uber Pro card, a business debit Mastercard for drivers and couriers. Based on a worker’s tier, they can get up to $1 off per gallon of gas through Upside — an app that offers cash rewards — and up to 21 cents off per gallon of gas with Shell Fuel Rewards. The company also offers incentives for drivers who want to switch to electric vehicles.
“We know the price of gas is top of mind for many rideshare and delivery drivers across the country right now,” Uber said in a blog post about its gas savings efforts.
Lyft also said it’s expanding gas relief through May 26 because the company knows that the extra cost “hits hardest for drivers who depend on driving for their income.”
The company is offering more cash back, depending on the driver’s tier, for drivers who use a Lyft Direct business debit card to pay for gas at eligible gas stations. They can get an additional 14 cents per gallon off through Upside.
Drivers say the fine print on the offers dictates which card they use and where they fill up gas, making it difficult for them to save money.
“If I do the math, it’s ridiculous,” Mejia said. “They’re offering us nothing.”
Uber declined to comment, but pointed to its blog post about the gas relief efforts. Lyft also referenced the blog post and said “the gas savings were structured through rewards to maximize stackable opportunities.”
Guests at The Westin St. Francis hotel get into an Uber.
(Jess Lynn Goss / For The Times)
Gig workers have struggled with rising gas prices in the past.
In 2022, Lyft and Uber temporarily added a surcharge to their fares amid record-high gas prices following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. This year, Uber is adding a fuel charge to its fares in Australia for roughly two months to offset the high cost of gas for drivers. Lyft said it hasn’t added a fuel charge in the U.S. or elsewhere.
Margarita Penalosa, who drives full time for Uber and Lyft in Los Angeles, started as a rideshare driver in 2017. Back then, gas was cheaper. She would easily hit her goal of making $300 in eight hours. Now she’s making just $250 after working as much as 14 hours.
Gas prices, she said, used to be less than $3 per gallon. Now some gas stations are charging more than $8 per gallon.
“Take out the gas. Take out the mileage from my car and maintenance. How much [do] I really make? Probably I get $11 for an hour,” she said.
Jonathan Tipton Meyers wants to spend fewer hours as a rideshare driver.
He already juggles multiple gigs even while driving for Uber and Lyft in Los Angeles. He’s a mobile notary and loan signing agent, a writer and performer.
Driving is “a very challenging, full-time job,” he said. “It’s very taxing and, of course, wages were just continually decreasing.”
John Mejia, a longtime Lyft and Uber driver, poses for a portrait before attending a meeting about unionizing gig drivers.
(Jess Lynn Goss / For The Times)
Even if oil continues to flow through the Strait of Hormuz, which Iran reopened Friday, it could take a while for gas prices to come down to earth, said Mark Zandi, the chief economist at Moody’s Analytics.
“There’s an old adage that prices rise like a rocket and fall like a feather,” he said. “I think that’ll apply.”
In the meantime, it will be survival of the fittest drivers. If enough of them decide to leave the apps, the ride-hailing companies could be forced to raise fares further to attract some back.
“Those who approach rideshare driving strategically, tracking expenses, choosing trips carefully, and optimizing efficiency are far more likely to weather periods of high gas prices,” wrote Avedian in the Rideshare Guy blog. “For everyone else, a spike at the pump can quickly turn rideshare driving from a side hustle into a money-losing venture.”
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