Staffing at Reagan Washington National Airport air control tower was ‘not normal’ on night of collision: FAA

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DC plane crash air traffic control audio reveals moment controllers saw disaster

Air traffic control (ATC) audio from Wednesday’s collision between an Army Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines jet reveals the moments before and after controllers witnessed the disaster unfold. (Credit: LiveATC.Net)

An internal preliminary report from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reportedly showed that the number of staff members working at the air control tower at Ronald Reagan National Airport in Arlington, Virginia, was “not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic.”

On Wednesday night, an American Airlines plane and Army helicopter collided near Reagan National Airport outside of Washington, D.C., and all 67 people onboard both aircraft are presumed to be dead.

The Associated Press obtained a report which showed one air traffic controller was working two positions at the time of the crash. 

Typically, the two assignments are split between two air traffic controllers, not just one.

FAA PANEL WARNS THAT CURRENT SAFETY LEVELS ARE ‘UNSUNSTAINABLE’

A general view of Reagan National Airport in Arlington, Virginia on Thursday, January 30, 2025. An American Airlines flight from Wichita, Kansas collided with a Black Hawk helicopter while approaching the airport for landing last night. (Leigh Green for Fox News Digital)

“The position configuration was not normal for the time of day and volume of traffic,” the report says.

The FAA did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s questions and request for comment on the matter.

The air control tower at Reagan airport has been understaffed for years with 19 fully certified controllers as of September 2023. However, staffing targets set by the FAA and the controllers’ union call for 30.

FAA INVESTS $121M FOR AIRPORT MODIFICATIONS TO REDUCE RISK OF RUNWAY INCURSIONS

Emergency response units assess airplane wreckage in the Potomac River near Ronald Reagan Washington Airport on January 30, 2025, in Arlington, Virginia. An American Airlines flight from Wichita, Kansas collided with a helicopter while approaching Ronald Reagan National Airport.  (Andrew Harnik/Getty Images)

The FAA’s air traffic controller shortage is nothing new at Reagan National or most of the country’s air traffic control facilities.

Last year, Frontier Airlines CEO Barry Biffle appeared on FOX Business Network’s “The Claman Countdown” and warned that shortages could cause issues during the summer season if they were not addressed.

Biffle explained that while technology could help address the issue while promoting greater efficiencies in air travel over the longer term, the air traffic controller shortage contributes to delays and cancelations.

FAA HEAD STRESSES NEED FOR AVIATION INDUSTRY TO END CLOSE CALLS, RENEWS SAFETY PUSH

Rescuers on a boat work next to the wreckage of a Black Hawk helicopter at the site of the crash after it collided with American Eagle Flight 5342 which was approaching Reagan Washington National Airport and crashed into the Potomac River, outside Washington, U.S., January 30, 2025.  (Kevin Lamarque/Reuters)

“There’s opportunities to improve the technology that is kind of the backbone of air traffic control,” Biffle said. “If you look to Europe, for example, there are some opportunities that we could adopt here that would be much more efficient — you’d burn a lot less fuel, get there faster and so forth. That is a big opportunity.

“At the same time, it doesn’t negate the issue that I think we’re 3,000 controllers short right now. And so that just causes, when you have a weather event, it just causes there to be more delays,” he explained. “And ultimately, like we’ve seen the last few days, those delays then turn into cancelations because crews time out and so forth. [I] would really like to see the staffing get fixed. The technology is probably a longer solution.”

The FAA’s National Airspace System (NAS) safety review team created in April 2023 following several close runway incursions during takeoffs or landings at busy airports, determined that year that the concurrence of several challenges such as the air traffic control staffing crunch, insufficient funding and outdated technology “results in an erosion of safety margins that must be urgently addressed.”

“The current erosion in the margin of safety in the NAS caused by the confluence of these challenges is rendering the current level of safety unsustainable,” the team’s report said.

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The cause of the shortage has been attributed to employee turnover and other factors like tight budgets, and ultimately, it has resulted in many controllers working 10-hour days and as many as six days a week, the Times reported.

Fox News Digital’s Louis Casiano contributed to this report.

Greg Wehner is a breaking news reporter for Fox News Digital.

Story tips and ideas can be sent to Greg.Wehner@Fox.com and on Twitter @GregWehner.