Thoughts On The Washington National Air Tragedy
I flew light aircraft for over twenty years as a hobby and to get about on business. I flew mainly in the UK, but flew for perhaps fifty to a hundred hours in Australia, France, Ireland, Italy and the United States. I flew planes on to islands like the Scillies in the UK, the Lido in Venice and the Barrier Reef in Australia. It was great fun and I enjoyed it immensely.
I had a friend, who had been an RAF Air Traffic Controller, who would be horrified at Trump’s remarks on diversity, as although he was white, he had been born in Tobago and had many ATC colleagues who were not white.
Flying around the world, most ATC personnel, try to smooth you on your way, even in France and Italy. But American ATC seems to work under unnecessary pressure because they allow planes to where British, French and Australian ATC wouldn’t.
I was told in the 1970s, that aviation experts, wanted to close National Airport, but the politicians wouldn’t allow it.
If I was Trump, I would bring in outside experts from somewhere like Australia, where in my opinion, they do ATC so much better than the Americans.
The Anonymous Widower 
Reading about the crash, I am sure that this is not the first accident here, I have vague memories of another air accident involving the Potomac river. I live directly under the flight path for Manchester airport, and after 36 years I only notice when the planes arent flying. I am about 12 minutes drive away. I have NEVER felt unsafe. Very very occasionally we will be aware of a helicopter up there – usually police or medical helicpter, but no planes fly over when they are flying. I dont really enjoy flying, and now I have compromised immunity I have been told to avoid it. Neil is fine flying and has also done a flight on a Tiger Moth and a Spitfire – both times the pilot let him take over the controls for a while. He really enjoyed that – he is interested in history and WW1 and WW2, so the spitfire flight was a real treat.
Comment by nosnikrapzil | January 31, 2025 |
Record indicate that the plane was correctly on its ATC cleared glide path and that the helicopter was flying at 350-400 feet, when its maxium altitude should have been 200 feet. Maybe an instrument malfunction showed it flying half the height it as, but otherwise the conclusion is obvious.
Particularly odious is President Trump’s assertion about diversity in ATC – he seems to be saying that is wrong and implying that if the ATC operator wasn’t a WASP that this would make them less qualified or capable.
Comment by Mark Clayton | January 31, 2025 |
I have a feeling that the RAF have a good number of non-white ATC personnel, but the person, who would know sadly died a couple of years ago. But I’ve never heard of any complaints of minority ethnic or women pilots or ATC staff in British aviation literature.
I can remember that C and myself went to Paris once on Air UK Shorts 360, and it was a complete all-female crew. Possibly the first in the UK. No passenger we heard, made any complaint.
Comment by AnonW | January 31, 2025 |