The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) chair, Jennifer Homendy, said the recording from the Black Hawk helicopter cockpit suggested the crew may have missed the key instruction just before the 29 January collision, in which all 67 people onboard the two aircraft were killed.
At one point during the flight before the collision, the helicopter’s pilot called out that the Black Hawk was at 300ft – but the instructor pilot said the helicopter was at 400ft, Homendy said.
The crew of the helicopter that collided in midair with an American Airlines jet near Washington DC’s Ronald Reagan National airport might not have heard instructions from the air traffic controller to pass behind the plane, investigators said on Friday.
Homendy said the Black Hawk crew never heard the words “pass behind the” during the transmission from the controller because the helicopter’s microphone key was depressed right then.
Homendy said the helicopter was on a check flight that night when the pilot was being tested on the use of night vision goggles and flying by instruments.
