American Eagle Flight 5342 Midair Collision with U.S. Army Black Hawk Helicopter

Shortly before 9:00 PM on January 29, 2025, a Bombardier CRJ 700 jet operated by PSA Airlines as American Eagle Flight 5342 that had been cleared by Air Traffic Control (ATC) to land at Reagan National Airport (DCA) was involved in a tragic midair collision with a U.S. Army Sikorsky UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter conducting a training flight. All 60 passengers and 4 flight crew members on board 5342 were killed, as well as the 3 crew members on the helicopter when the wreckage plummeted into the Potomac River.

According to ATC recordings, Flight 5342 was initially given instructions by ATC to land on Runway 1 at DCA before the controller directed them to circle and cleared them to land on Runway 33. The Black Hawk was in communication with the same controller as it transited the low level helicopter corridor over the Potomac River. Seeing both aircraft in close proximity, the controller communicated to the pilot of the helicopter to fly behind 5342 who acknowledged the instruction. It appears that no safety alert was given by the controller.

A joint investigation is being conducted by the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the Department of Defense. The NTSB is a non-partisan, independent agency of the federal government responsible for investigations of transportation accidents to determine the probable cause of the collision and to make safety recommendations to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) so as to prevent future accidents. While this investigation remains in its very early stages, some areas of focus will be the precise location and altitude of each aircraft at the time of the collision, the instructions provided by the controller to each aircraft, staffing inside the ATC tower at DCA, and the safety of shared flight space at DCA.

More areas of focus are likely to come up over the next several months that will be closely monitored by the Baumeister & Samuels team. There are very strict requirements for suing the federal government under the Federal Tort Claims Act, and we have decades of experience litigating with the federal government who are responsible for the air traffic control system in this country and the operation of the nation’s armed forces.