U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell lands at Reagan airport minutes before deadly plane, Army helicopter crash

U.S. Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) told KTVU that he landed at Reagan National Airport on Wednesday night just minutes before the deadly crash between an Army helicopter and a passenger airline. 

Local perspective:

Swalwell said he was flying to the D.C. area from Houston, where he had been visiting his parents and had some meetings.

Dig deeper:

He noted that there has always been a "crowded airspace" between the Reagan airport, Dulles International Airport, Baltimore/Washington International Thurgood Marshall Airport and Andrews Air Force Space, where the president flies out of.

"We have to make sure that we can manage and all the travel that goes through here," Swalwell said. "And so that's going to be a priority in the future."

Swalwell said there is a lot to unpack. 

"We have to understand whether the congested air traffic in this region was a part of the cause," he said. "We also need to understand whether we have enough air travel controllers to deconflict congested areas, and so there's a lot we have to do." 

Washington, DC's Reagan National Airport is home to the country's busiest runway, with over 800 takeoffs and landings a day, according to the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority. 

"It's a beehive of activity," Dennis Tajer, an American Airlines captain and spokesperson for its pilot union, told The Washington Post. "It's extremely compact, and it's a high volume of traffic.

Aviation consultant Mike McCarron, who used to be the spokesman for San Francisco International Airport, said that area is well-known for its busy nature. 

"It's just a congested airspace, regardless of commercial, military or civilian," he said. "There's a lot of things going on in that airspace, like very narrow corridors because there is so much restricted airspace around D.C."

What we know:

As of Thursday morning, officials said at least 28 bodies were pulled from the icy waters of the Potomac River after an American Airlines jet carrying 60 passengers and four crew members collided with an Army helicopter while landing at Ronald Reagan National Airport near Washington D.C.

Officials said flight conditions were clear as the jet coming from Wichita, Kansas, was making a routine landing when the helicopter flew into its path. Three soldiers were onboard the helicopter during a training flight, an Army official said.

Passengers on the flight included a group of figure skaters, their coaches and family members who were returning from a development camp that followed the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Wichita.

Crews were still searching for other casualties but did not believe there were any survivors, which would make it the deadliest U.S. air crash in nearly 24 years.

What we don't know:

There was no immediate word on the cause of the collision. 

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