The collision between a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter and a passenger jet over Washington on Wednesday, which killed 67 people, comes at a terrible time for Army Aviation as accident rates have spiked to levels not seen since early in the century.
In 2024, Army Aviation recorded the highest number of Class A flight mishaps — the most serious type of aircraft accidents — since 2014 and the worst Class A flight mishap rate per 100,000 hours since 2007, according to new statistics from the Aviation Division of the Directorate of Analysis and Prevention at the U.S. Army Combat Readiness Center. Class A mishaps are those that result in at least $2.5 million in property damage, the destruction of a manned aircraft, and/or a fatality or a catastrophic injury.
The Army suffered 15 Class A flight mishaps and two Class A aircraft ground mishaps last year compared to nine flight and one aircraft ground accidents in 2023, and just four flight and four ground mishaps in 2022. (The Army measures all years by fiscal year.) Nine soldiers, one contractor, and one civilian died in flight mishaps in 2024. Another contractor died in an aircraft ground mishap.
“A year that Army Aviation looks back on in hopes of never repeating.”
In its January issue, Flightfax, a newsletter focused on “Army Aircraft Mishap Prevention,” wrote that 2024 “will be a year that Army Aviation looks back on in hopes of never repeating.”
The Army described the helicopter which crashed into the American Airlines Bombardier CRJ-700 regional jet as a UH-60 Black Hawk from Bravo Company of the 12th Aviation Battalion at Davison Army Airfield, based at Fort Belvoir in Virginia. The helicopter was on a training flight, according to the Defense Department. Military aircraft frequently conduct training flights in and around Washington’s congested and heavily restricted airspace.
There was one Class A mishap involving a UH-60 Black Hawk in 2024, according to the Directorate of Analysis and Prevention. Black Hawks also suffered 13 Class C mishaps. Such accidents can still result in more than half a million dollars in damage and nonfatal injuries that result in time away from work or training. The 13 Class C mishaps involving Black Hawks were tied for third most across 17 different aircraft types tracked by the Army.
The AH-64 Apache helicopter — which first flew in 1975 — saw the most Class A mishaps last year. Eight of the nine were attributed to human error; one resulted from a bird strike.
“Our top priority is to assist in the recovery efforts, while fully cooperating with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and other investigative agencies to determine the cause of this tragic incident,” said Maj. Gen. Trevor J. Bredenkamp, commander of the Joint Task Force–National Capital Region/ U.S. Army Military District of Washington in the wake of Wednesday night’s crash. “While the investigation is ongoing, we are committed to transparency and will share accurate updates as soon as they become available,”
The Army did not respond to questions regarding the safety record of the Army’s 12th Aviation Battalion. The Pentagon did not reply to request for comment about mishaps involving helicopters across the service branches.
The three-person Army crew aboard the Black Hawk was “fairly experienced” according to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth.
The average flight experience across the Army is down approximately 300 flight hours per aviator, according to an Army study using data from 2013 to 2023. The Army found that while crew experience was not cited in every mishap, the overall loss is “a hazard that must be considered.”
President Donald Trump suggested that diversity, equity and inclusion programs could be the cause of Wednesday’s collision. Neither the Army nor the Pentagon responded to The Intercept’s questions about whether there was any evidence to support this.
American Eagle Flight 5342, a regional jetliner, was carrying 60 passengers and four crew members on a flight from Wichita, Kansas; there were no survivors.
Fatal accidents involving commercial airliners in the United States are extremely rare. Wednesday’s deadly crash marks the first major crash involving a commercial plane in the U.S. since 2009, according to the National Transportation Safety Board, when a Colgan Air flight went down on its way to New York’s Buffalo Niagara International Airport, killing all 49 people aboard and one person on the ground.
