RICHMOND, Va. (WWBT/Gray News) – A retired pilot gave a first-hand view of what it’s like to land at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
Chuck Smith says he has made that approach and landing hundreds of times in his career.
He shared a video showing what it looks like to fly near Washington, D.C., and over the Potomac River.
He says the airspace is notoriously busy with commercial, military and other aircraft.
While he has made that approach onto runway 33 numerous times, there were always concerns in the back of his head.
“It’s awful, and you know, it could have happened to any of us,” Smith reflected Thursday.
The GoPro video he shared was recorded on a clear Christmas morning in 2013 after Smith had just made captain of Republic Airways, a regional carrier.
He flew an Embraer 175, similar in size and passenger capacity to the American Airlines CRJ-700 involved in the midair collision with a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter over the Potomac River on Wednesday night.
The video shows the same approach, during daytime hours, that the pilots of those aircraft would have taken.
“You can see, when you start seeing the shadow of the airplane over the river, is where the collision took place,” Smith described.
He said that approach is especially complicated, given all of the air traffic there.
“Very few approaches do not have some type of traffic other than commercial airlines that are flying around. The news helicopters, the Coast Guard has a base there, and of course, the military fly through that area all the time,” Smith said. “So, there was always traffic in the area on most of those approaches.”
He said he did find it concerning at times.
“We always said it was just a matter of time, and it happened,” Smith said.
He went on to add that air traffic controllers at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport have an incredibly tough job.
“Those guys are great. With the amount of traffic that goes in and out of that airport, to have those guys control it for all these years with no issues, they’ve done an incredible job,” Smith said.
But he acknowledged there was a failure on Wednesday night.
“The helicopter should not have been through that corridor at that exact time when the aircraft was coming in,” Smith said, adding that the air traffic control tower should have been directing better.
Copyright 2025 WWBT via Gray Local Media, Inc. All rights reserved.