DC Plane Crash: 23 Victims Still Missing, 2 Army Crew Members ID'ed

Updated at 5:50 p.m.

ARLINGTON, VA — The Army has released the names of two of the three soldiers who died when their Black Hawk helicopter collided with an American Airlines jet on Wednesday. In all, 67 peopled died in the crash: 60 plane passengers, four American Airlines crew members and the Army flight crew.

Barges are on the way from Virginia Beach and will be in place by Saturday afternoon to help move a portion of the American Airlines plane lying in the Potomac River, a federal investigator said Friday. National Transportation Safety Board spokesman Todd Inman told reporters cranes on the barges will recover the sections of helicopter and the jet.

That should allow searchers to find and recover the 23 crash victims still missing, the Washingon, D.C. fire chief said Friday afternoon.

The two black boxes in the plane that will tell investigators what happened right before the jet and the helicopter collided at Reagan National Airport outside Washington, D.C., were recovered by divers Thursday.

Inman said the helicopter's black box was retrieved from the river Friday with no signs of exterior damage. He has a high level of confidence they will be able to extract information from it.

The remains of Staff Sgt. Ryan Austin O’Hara, 28, of Lilburn, Georgia, the crew chief, have been recovered and a positive identification is pending, the Army said.

The remains of Chief Warrant Officer 2 Andrew Loyd Eaves of Great Mills, Maryland, and of the third soldier have not yet been recovered.

The 39-year-old Eaves, one of the pilots on the helicopter, served in the U.S. Navy from August 2007 to September 2017, then moved to the Army, to serve as a Black Hawk pilot.

His awards include three Army commendation medals and three Navy achievement medals, as well as a Global War on Terrorism medal.

O’Hara had served as a helicopter repairer for Black Hawks since July 2014. He deployed to Afghanistan from March to August 2017. He also has two Army commendation medals, four achievement medals and a Global War on Terrorism medal.

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The name of the third crew member killed in the crash is not being released at this time at the family's request, the Army said. Media reports from family members said Jonathan Campos, 34, of Florida, was the pilot of the helicopter.

The task of retrieving the bodies paused Friday to wait for the heavy machinery en route to the site; 41 bodies have been recovered, said D.C. Fire and EMS Chief John Donnelly on Friday afternoon.

"I believe when we remove the aircraft that will help us resolve that number and if it doesn’t we’ll continue the search," Donnelly said. "We think we know where (the vicitms) are. We expect to recover all of the bodies.”

As of mid-afternoon Friday, Donnelly said authorities have identified 28 victims; 18 families have been notified their loved ones were killed; and two Coast Guard cutters are at the crash site to monitor the scene and search efforts.

If members of the public see crash debris or human remains they should not touch it, Donnelly said. Instead, call 911 and officials will send someone to pick up the items.

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The cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder of the American Airlines plane are now at the National Transportation Safety Board labs for evaluation to help determine what caused the crash. A preliminary report on what caused the mishap is expected in 30 days.

A total of 67 people died in Wednesday night's crash; more than 40 victims had been removed from the water as of late Thursday afternoon, CNN reported.

The names of passengers and crew on the American flight, as well as the names of the three service members killed on the helicopter, has yet to be officially released, although family members and friends have named some of those lost. Federal authorities said that information would come from the Washington, D.C., medical examiner's office.

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The official said rescuers had also recovered “a number of body parts” amid the debris from both aircraft. The D.C. Fire and EMS Department said the investigation and recovery efforts will continue today to find parts of the aircraft.

A mobile morgue was established near the crash site, where medical personnel are processing the victims’ remains as divers recover them,CNN reported. Once the remains are processed, they are taken to a morgue, so the victims’ families can eventually receive the remains of their loved ones.

As of Friday morning, no remains had been brought to the mobile morgue in more than 12 hours, the network reported. Officials said they will need to move some of the wreckage with heavy machinery, which will soon be brought to the crash site, in order to find the other victims' remains.

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Experts will study the flight paths of the passenger plan and the helicopter before the crash as they work to determine what caused the catastrophic collision. The Black Hawk helicopter may have been flying higher than the 200-feet altitude it was supposed to maintain and a half-mile off its designated route, according to the New York Times.

The Federal Aviation Administration said Friday that it will indefinitely close two low-altitude helicopter routes near Reagan Airport to most helicopters, with exceptions being made for police and medical helicopters, Reuters reported.

A top Army aviation official said the helicopter crew was “very experienced” and familiar with the congested flying that occurs daily around the city.

“Both pilots had flown this specific route before, at night. This wasn’t something new to either one of them,” said Jonathan Koziol, chief of staff for Army aviation.

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President DonaldTrump said in a Friday morning post on his Truth Social platform that the helicopter was “flying too high” at the time of the crash.

“It was far above the 200 foot limit. That’s not really too complicated to understand, is it???” Trump said.

His comments came a day after he questioned the helicopter pilot's actions while also blaming diversity initiatives for undermining air safety.

Factors in the crash, including the helicopter’s altitude and whether the crew was using its night vision goggles, are still under investigation, Hegseth said.

It was not immediately clear whether it exceeded the altitude limit, but Hegseth said altitude seemed to be a factor in the collision. Koziol said investigators need to analyze the flight data before making conclusions about altitude.

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On two occasions in the past three years, passenger planes had to take evasive action to avoid helicopters while on approach to Reagan National, CNN reported. In both cases, the pilots were warned to the presence of the other aircraft by the plane’s Traffic Collision Avoidance System.

In a third incident involving two helicopters, an air traffic controller’s report said “there isn’t enough staffing to fill all positions in the tower (cabin).”

Staffing in the air traffic control tower was "not normal" at the time of the midair collision near Washington, according to a Federal Aviation Administration report obtained by the Associated Press. Details on this can be found here.

The two pilots of American Eagle Flight 5342 have been identified by their families as Captain Jonathan Campos, 34, of Florida, and First Officer Sam Lilley, 28, of Savannah, Georgia, The Daily Mail reported.

Also, media reports in Atlanta said that Ryan O’Hara was the helicopter's crew chief.

Close Call At Reagan Airport 24 hours Before Collision

Just over 24 hours before Wednesday’s fatal midair collision, a different regional jet executed a go-around maneuver when descending to land at Reagan Airport due to a military helicopter in the same area.

Flight tracking sites and air traffic control logs show the Embraer E-175 was cleared to land at the airport’s Runway 19 and advised about a helicopter in its vicinity. It executed a go-around after its automated collision avoidance system ordered what is known as a ‘resolution advisory’ to avoid nearby traffic, which put the aircraft out of proper alignment for landing. It landed safely minutes later.

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The military helicopter, callsign PAT1, was advised of the descending airplane. Flight tracking sites show the plane flew roughly 1,000 feet (300 meters) above the helicopter, a normally acceptable separation.

Airline pilots are trained to respond immediately to resolution advisories, which are designed to avoid a potential mishap, but occasionally sound alarms for traffic that does not pose an immediate threat to safety.

President's Remarks

President Donald Trump spoke to the press corps Thursday and offered his condolences, and the nation's, to the families of the victims.

“We are in mourning, this has shaken a lot of people," the president said. "We can only begin to imagine the agony you are feeling. Our prayers are with you now and in the days to come.”

Trump then seemed to blame the Biden Administration's DEI hiring policy and air traffic controllers for the crash. There has been no discussion of what caused the crash so far from federal investigators, including the National Transportation Safety Board, which has taken over the inquiry.

Trump criticized diversity hiring efforts at the FAA, though when pressed about why, he acknowledged that there is no evidence yet that it could be blamed for the collision.

“It just could have been,” he said. "I have common sense."

Regional Leaders React

“This morning we all share a profound sense of grief,” Washington, D.C. mayor Muriel Bowser said.

Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin said on CNN that every effort is being put forth to make sure that every loved one is accounted for at the crash site.

"I can’t begin to express the heartfelt sympathy from the Commonwealth," Youngkin said. "The work today is to make sure everyone is recovered and the families are given the tremendous support they will need."

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When asked if he had concerns on the traffic volume of aircraft at Reagan National, Youngkin said it is a very busy area, but it’s a busy area that has been safe.

"Investigation will be critically important to determine what happened and make sure it never happened again. Air travel in the US is the safest in the world, and yet this happened."

A figure skating coach in Ashburn, Virginia, was among the victims presumed dead in the Wednesday night crash of an American Airlines plane with a military helicopter near Reagan National Airport. Inna Volanskaya, a coach at the Ashburn Ice House, is among the 67 victims who authorities believe are dead in the plane crash, Rep. Suhas Subramanyan (D-Loudoun) said on Thursday.

President Donald Trump said early Thursday that the crash at Reagan Airport "should have been prevented."

In a post to his social media platform Truth Social, Trump said:

The airplane was on a perfect and routine line of approach to the airport. The helicopter was going straight at the airplane for an extended period of time. It is a CLEAR NIGHT, the lights on the plane were blazing, why didn’t the helicopter go up or down, or turn. Why didn’t the control tower tell the helicopter what to do instead of asking if they saw the plane. This is a bad situation that looks like it should have been prevented. NOT GOOD!!!

Two minutes later, he added, "What a terrible night this has been. God bless you all!"

Final Minutes Of Flight

The collision said the crash happened in some of the most tightly controlled and monitored airspace in the world, just over three miles south of the White House and the Capitol.

Investigators will try to piece together the aircrafts' final moments before their collision, including contact with air traffic controllers as well as a loss of altitude by the passenger jet.

The plane was at an altitude of about 400 feet and a speed of about 140 miles per hour when it suffered a rapid loss of altitude over the Potomac River, according to data from its radio transponder. The Canadian-made twin-engine jet was manufactured in 2004 and can be configured to carry up to 70 passengers.

A few minutes before landing, air traffic controllers asked the arriving commercial jet if it could land on the shorter Runway 33 at Reagan National and the pilots said they were able. Controllers then cleared the plane to land on Runway 33. Flight tracking sites showed the plane adjust its approach to the new runway.

In audio from the air traffic control tower around the time of the crash, a controller is heard asking the helicopter, “PAT25 do you have the CRJ in sight,” in reference to the passenger aircraft.

“Tower did you see that?” another pilot is heard calling seconds after the apparent collision.

The tower immediately began diverting other aircraft from Reagan.

Video from an observation camera at the nearby Kennedy Center showed two sets of lights consistent with aircraft appearing to join in a fireball.

Reagan National is located along the Potomac River, just southwest of the city. It’s a popular choice because it’s much closer than the larger Dulles International Airport, which is deeper in Virginia.

More on the crash can be found here.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.