On January 30, 2025, American Airlines Flight 5342 collided with a U.S. Army Black Hawk Helicopter above the Potomac River by the Reagan National Airport. The American Airlines plane had taken off from Wichita, Kansas at 5:18pm with 60 passengers and four crew members. On the Black Hawk, 3 soldiers were on a training flight. The crash occurred around 8:48pm when Flight 5342 was preparing to land. This was the most fatal crash of commercial planes in the US since 2009 when 45 passengers and 4 crew members were killed as the aircraft crashed into a house. According to the CAO (Civil Aviation Organization), the odds of dying in a plane crash are one in 11 million, while the odds of being in a car crash are around one in 5,000. The possibility of a fatal plane crash is significantly rare, so how did this happen? 

Of the 60 passengers, 28 of them were a part of the figure skating community. The figure skaters were just returning from the National Development Camp in Wichita. There were 11 young skaters from 5 different clubs that lost their lives. After the news of this crash, many netizens, online citizens, brought up a similar incident in 1961 when 18 members of the US figure skating team died in a fatal plane crash. Along with the 28 members of the figure skating world, many other people had passed in the plane crash.

Additionally, on the Black Hawk, three soldiers were killed: Rebecca Lobach, Andrew Eaves, and Ryan O’Hara. The pilot had more than 1,000 flying hours and the copilot had around 500, so they were both relatively experienced. 

The plane was preparing to land at the airport when it clashed with the Black Hawk. There isn’t much evidence on how the crash happened, but while investigating, it was found that the helicopter was supposedly flying approximately 200 feet higher than it should have been during the time of the crash. As of February 8, 2025, most of the main pieces of the plane and helicopter had been recovered and all 67 victims bodies had been recovered.