The Army helicopter that crashed into an American Airlines plane on Wednesday night above Washington, D.C., was on a routine training flight, officials said Thursday.
“It was a fairly experienced crew that was doing a required annual night evaluation,” Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said in a social media video. “It was an annual proficiency training flight.”
The 12th Aviation Battalion, which was flying the helicopter, was placed on a 48-hour pause, Hegseth said. The three soldiers on board the UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter were killed in the crash, and the Army has identified them but is not yet releasing their names publicly, Hegseth said.
American Airlines Flight 5342 from Wichita, Kansas, to Ronald Reagan National Airport near Washington, D.C., collided with the helicopter in midair just before 9 p.m. Wednesday over the Potomac River.
All 60 passengers and four crew members on board the aircraft, in addition to the three soldiers on the Black Hawk, are presumed dead. It is the deadliest airplane crash in the U.S. since November 2001 and the nation’s first commercial air disaster since a Continental Airlines flight crashed in February 2009.
Military helicopters are a common sight in the Washington, D.C., area, and the 12th Aviation Battalion is often responsible for transporting high-ranking government and military officials around the region. However, the Pentagon has confirmed no senior leaders were on the Black Hawk that crashed Wednesday.
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