US admits failures in deadly mid-air crash at DC’s Reagan National Airport

(WASHINGTON) — The U.S. government admitted some failures and accepted liability for its role in the deadly Jan. 29 mid-air crash over the Potomac River between a commercial jet and an Army helicopter, according to a filing in a civil suit, but pushed back on a number of claims that were made.

The filing came in response to a suit brought by the family of one of the 67 people killed in the crash between a U.S. military Black Hawk helicopter and an American Airlines flight operated by a regional carrier. The family’s lawsuit serves as the “master complaint” on behalf of all deceased passengers.

The regional jet and Black Hawk helicopter both crashed into the icy Potomac River after colliding in midair, launching an overnight search and rescue mission, with no survivors found. Sixty-four people were on the plane and three Army soldiers were aboard the helicopter, which was on a training flight at the time, officials said.  

The government attorneys, in their 209-page filling on Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Washington, said that the pilots of both the Black Hawk and the regional jet “failed to maintain vigilance so as to see and avoid each other.”

And it admitted that the Black Hawk pilots’ failure to maintain vigilance was “a proximate cause” of the accident.

“The United States admits that it owed a duty of care to Plaintiffs, which it breached, thereby proximately causing the tragic accident on January 29, 2025,” the government said in the filing.

The government also conceded that the air traffic controller at Reagan National Airport did not comply with regulations that state “[i]f aircraft are on converging courses, inform the other aircraft of the traffic and that visual separation is being applied.”

But it did not concede, as alleged, that the actions of the controller were responsible for the crash.

“The United States denies that any alleged negligence of the air traffic controllers on position in Washington Tower during the accident was a cause-in-fact and a proximate cause of the accident and the death of DECEDENT,” the filing says.

And it denied, as alleged in the suit, that the extremely busy airspace above Reagan National Airport presented an “accident waiting to happen.”

The government conceded that while the airspace above Reagan National is “busy at times and the risk of midair collision cannot be reduced to zero” and “that aircraft have come into close proximity to other aircraft within the Class B airspace near DCA on certain occasions” it did not admit to “collective failures” that led to the crash.

The original lawsuit as it was filed says that among the factors known to the military was that there had been “a substantial number of ‘near miss’ events in and around DCA, which were required to be analyzed to ensure that a mid-air collision did not occur and required Defendants to exercise vigilance when operating and/or controlling aircraft in the vicinity of DCA.” 

But the government denied the statement that those known misses “were required to be analyzed to ensure that a mid-air collision did not occur and required Defendants to exercise vigilance when operating and/or controlling aircraft in the vicinity of DCA.” 

An attorney for one of the plaintiffs in the case, Rachel Crafton, said in a statement responding to the U.S. filing, “These families remain deeply saddened and anchored in the grief caused by this tragic loss of life.”

“We continue to investigate this matter to ensure all parties at fault are held accountable, and we await additional findings from the NTSB in an anticipated January 26 hearing on this matter in Washington, D.C,” said attorney Robert A. Clifford, who represents Crafton. 

The National Transportation Safety Board is expected to release its final report with the probable cause and its recommendations by the anniversary of the crash on Jan. 29, 2026. 

District Judge Ana C. Reyes, who was appointed in 2023, is presiding over the case, according to court records. 

Editor’s Note: A prior version of this story incorrectly attributed allegations from the family’s “master complaint” to the U.S. government, which had reprinted those allegations in its Wednesday filing in order to respond to them.

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