[Plane Wreck Crash Landing. Photo credit to Pixabay] 

On January 29th, 2025, the PSA Airlines Flight 5342 collided mid-air with a United States Army Sikorsky VH-60M Black Hawk, presumably killing all 67 people on board both aircrafts. 

The flight was a scheduled domestic passenger service from Wichita Dwight D. Eisenhower National Airport in Kansas to the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport near Washington D.C. 

Just hours after the devastating crash, flights resumed at the Ronald Reagan National Airport, with a Southwest Airlines flight from Nashville being  the first to land at the airport following the incident. 

Minutes before the collision, the air traffic control in the helicopter instructed the pilots to maintain visual separation and pass behind the approaching aircraft. 

However, moments later, the two aircraft collided near the Potomac River, causing the helicopter to explode on impact. 

The airliner broke apart, which ceased transmission about 2,400 feet short of Runway 33; the crash was captured on video by a webcam at the Kennedy Center and witnessed by pilots of a nearby aircraft. 

Emergency personnel, including the DC Fire and Emergency Medical Services and Maryland State Police, arrived at the scene within just minutes; fireboats and divers additionally conducted  search and rescue operations, but no survivors had been reported within hours after. 

Nevertheless, officials remain confident that they will recover the bodies of those killed during the collision. 

Several members of the figure skating community were among the victims of the crash, returning  from a developmental camp in Wichita; the Skating Club of Boston named six victims, including the 1994 world champs Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov. 

Returning from the competition, the couple was travelling with a group of young skaters from the same club, many of whom were children of Russian emigrants to the United States. 

Reports also confirmed that Inna Volyanskaya, a former Soviet Union figure skater and a coach at the Washington Figure Skating Club,  was on board. 

The  National Transportation Safety Board is currently leading the investigation. 

Donald Trump, recently re-elected as President of the United States, questioned the role of the helicopter pilot and air traffic control while also politicizing his response by  faulting past presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden. 

Regarding the helicopter, Trump claimed that it was “going at an angle that was unbelievably bad”, expressing that there was “a pilot problem from the standpoint of the helicopter”, without specifying what the “problem” was.

Trump also stated that authorities “will be giving [the list of passenger names] very soon”, adding that he will be announcing soon the other nationalities who were on board the American Airlines plane. 

Trump has been very vocal about his thoughts and speculations regarding the crash, often directly blatantly accusing the helicopter for “[doing] somewhat the opposite of what it was told to do”. 

After confirming that there were no survivors from the plane crash, the 47th president requested that the US faces an “hour of anguish” for the victims and their families. 

Adopting a more combative tone, he is complaining about diversity and inclusion in FAA programmes and describing former transportation secretary Pete Buttigieg as someone who “has a good line in bullsh*t”. 

As of this very minute, authorities continue their recovery efforts, and investigations are ongoing to determine the exact cause of the tragedy.