In The Shadow Of Mt Hollywood

Just this morning : The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has reportedly extended a buyout offer to its entire workforce. This follows President Trump’s proposal to encourage millions of federal workers to resign by February 6 in exchange for pay and benefits lasting until September 30. Trump is offering the buyouts to make sure all federal workers are “on board with the new administration’s plan to have federal employees in office,” CNBC reported. Only 6% of all federal workers actually work full-time in the office! This follows : After going offline over the weekend as part of Trump’s goal to streamline federal operations and slash government spending, the official website of USAID is back online—but not for the reasons anyone expected. The agency’s website now serves as a digital pink slip for its global workforce. All USAID direct hire personnel are to be placed on administrative leave globally, with mandates for many to return to the U.S. This directive excludes onl...

' After the NTSB press conference Saturday afternoon, in which it was announced that the regional jet's altitude was 325 feet at the time of the collision when the helicopter should have been no higher than 200 feet -- and a faction of the NTSB investigators didn't want this released -- while the Army revealed the identity of the pilot almost concurrently, we've learned nothing more. Somewhat belatedly, Juan Browne posted an update late yesterday that does little other than summarize what we knew Saturdday afternoon. At 2:20, he estasblishes that this was a check flight for Cpt Lobach, and the check pilot was Chief Warrant Officer 2 Eaves. The point neither he nor anyone else has made on this is that Cpt Lobach inarguably failed her check flight. He establishes that a total flight time for an Army helicopter pilot at this stage of her career of 450 hours is "about normal", although this would be very low for a fixed-wing pilot. He says, "the Army ha...

Last month, Capt. Lobach escorted fashion designer @RalphLauren at the White House when he received his Presidential Medal of Freedom. https://t.co/GyTGMliwaI pic.twitter.com/fDMX5W3m40 — Jim LaPorta (@JimLaPorta) February 1, 2025 Over the weekend, the Army finallly released the name of the third pilot -- apparently the one at the controls -- of the helicopter that crashed into the regional jet Wednesday evening, killing 67. At the request of and in coordination with the family, the Army is releasing the name of the third Soldier who died while performing a training mission near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on Jan. 29. Capt. Rebecca M. Lobach, of Durham, North Carolina, served as an aviation officer (15A) in the regular Army from July 2019 to January 2025. She has no deployments. She was assigned to the 12th Aviation Battalion, Ft Belvoir, Va. It turns out that the three-day delay, which was atrributed to the request of the family, must have been to...

This is the question Juan Browne, the highly respected aviation YouTuber, asked in the post above nine months ago. He continued, In the last couple of days, we've had no less than three to four major incidents that, if we continue to perform at this level, will eventually lead to disaster. He was clearly correct in his prediction. Whatever the efficient cause of Wednesday night's collision -- and based on the information that's slowly dribbling out, a politically connected DEI helicopter pilot may be partially responsible -- the formal cause seems to be the long-festering disorder within the air traffic control system, run by the FAA. If this particular glitch didn't cause a disaster, the next one would have. Browne discusses in detail three of the incidents he refers to. The most interesting for us here took place on April 18 last year at Reagan National, where Wednesday night's collision also took place. He begins his discussion of this at 7:31. It...

As an avid viewer of Air Disasters reruns on the Smithsonian Channel, I've been trying to soak up every detail about the Washington regional jet-Army helicopter collision. But one comment by a Fox News guest sums up the whole situation: "It's our system that is bad and that's what has to be looked at. To be honest with you… we need to take a bulldozer to the front of the FAA. This is bad management, and it's putting us at risk," Boyd Group International President Mike Boyd said Thursday in reaction on "Mornings with Maria." "We had two flying machines run into each other over the Potomac. That is the FAA's job to avoid those things," he argued. "We have all kinds of human issues here. But the fact is, we've had near-miss after near-miss for the past 20 years. Now we've had a collision. The collision is the responsibility of the FAA and the air traffic control system. Somebody failed." Until late yesterda...

So far, I think the best single source on the Washington, DC collision of a regional jet and an Army helicopter is the YouTube updates by longtime pilot Juan Browne on his blancolirio channel. I linked his first one in yesterday's post. Embedded above is an update from yesterday afternoon. I'll refer to several other sources that tend to confirm or expand his views in this post as well. It's worth noting that American Airlines CEO Robert Isom iossued a preliminary statement at a press conference yesterday , “At this time, we don’t know why the military aircraft came into the path of the PSA aircraft,” Isom said at a Thursday morning press conference. Isom said in a staff note Thursday that the National Transportation Safety Board would be the “sole source of truth going forward, and accuracy is of the utmost importance.” PSA Airlines is an American Airlines subsidiary and one of its regional carriers. American Eagle is how American Airlines brands its regiona...

NOW — Transportation Sec. Sean Duffy: “Whether it was air traffic control, whether it was military aircraft, helicopters or the American flight, everything was standard in the lead up to the crash … Something happened here.” pic.twitter.com/ojRVAf34ZO — Chief Nerd (@TheChiefNerd) January 30, 2025 A YouTube commentator that I trust on aviation matters, Juan Browne on the blancolirio channel, a working airline pilot with both military and civilian experience, has a good video with graphics. At 0:50, he says, . . . the [Regional Jet] flies the approach to this Runway, 1, the long runway, and then sidesteps around here to a left dogleg entry to Runway 33, the relatively short runway at about 5200 feet long here at Washington DC, a very demanding approach. This crew is focused on this approach. This midair collision occurred just below 400 feet above the ground. The National Guard helicopter, believed to be eithet as UH60 or VH60, was presumably operating out of Joint Base B...