Army Identifies Two Soldiers Who Died in Helicopter-Plane Collision
The identity of the third soldier has been kept confidential at the request of the family.
The Army has disclosed the names of two soldiers who lost their lives in a collision with an American Airlines jet near Ronald Reagan National Airport on January 29.
Family members have requested that the name of a third soldier remain confidential at this time.
Response teams have successfully recovered the body of the flight’s crew chief, Staff Sgt. Ryan Austin O’Hara. The remains of Chief Warrant Officer Andrew Lloyd Eaves and the unnamed third soldier have not yet been located.
Army Aviation Directorate Chief of Staff Jonathan Koziol informed reporters on January 30 that the soldiers were engaged in flight training at the moment of the crash.
According to Koziol, the instructor was a seasoned pilot with more than 1,000 hours of flying experience.
Investigations into the precise cause of the incident are still underway. On January 30, recovery teams managed to extract the flight data recorder, commonly referred to as the “black box,” from the passenger jet, which will be examined to ascertain what transpired.
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The Associated Press also reported on Thursday that initial findings from the Federal Aviation Administration indicated that the staffing at the air traffic control tower was “not normal,” with one employee potentially handling the workload of two.
The crash, which resulted in 67 fatalities, occurred on Wednesday evening when an Army Black Hawk helicopter collided with a jet flying from Wichita, Kansas, causing both aircraft to plunge into the neighboring Potomac River. There were no survivors.
Todd Inman, a member of the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), stated that the impact was so sudden that there was no sign of any emergency safety protocols being activated prior to the plane striking the water. The NTSB is anticipated to publish a preliminary report within 30 days.
John Donnelly, chief of Fire and Emergency Medical Services for Washington, mentioned on January 31 that recovery teams had located the remains of 41 passengers and had identified 28 of them.
Authorities confirmed that the jet was transporting members of the professional figure skating community, including the 1994 world pairs champions Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov.
Donnelly added that recovery crews must extricate the aircraft’s wreckage, currently submerged in the riverbed, before they can access the additional remains of the passengers.
President Donald Trump stated to reporters at the Oval Office on January 30 that he plans to meet with the families of the victims and chose not to offer further details.
The Associated Press and Travis Gilmore contributed to this report.
