Earlier Friday, a small plane crashed in Boca Raton, Florida, killing the three people on board and injuring one man on the ground, authorities said.
The Federal Aviation Administration identified the aircraft as a Cessna 310R that took off from Boca Raton Airport bound for Tallahassee International Airport and crashed less than 20 minutes into its flight.
All three people aboard the small plane were killed, while one man on the ground sustained non-life-threatening injuries.
Michael LaSalle, assistant fire chief for Boca Fire Rescue, said the plane &#8220;had apparently some mechanical issues and went down here on Military Trail.&#8221; He added, &#8220;He hit a tree because of all the debris and the fire.&#8221;
A witness recalled seeing the aircraft flying uncommonly close to nearby buildings, appearing as though it might clip the roof of one structure before it veered off.
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JUST IN: A plane has crashed in Boca Raton, Florida resulting in three de*ths, according to local news reports.
The plane was approaching Boca Raton Airport with “mechanical issues,” according to Boca News Now.
Fire rescue was reportedly on “alert” as the plane was nearing the… <a href="https://t.co/ST3oGmOsgv">pic.twitter.com/ST3oGmOsgv</a>
&mdash; Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) <a href="https://twitter.com/CollinRugg/status/1910712201117392996?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 11, 2025</a></blockquote>
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&#8220;I saw the plane, basically, turn, come back, and I heard it and saw it go over our building,&#8221; Dillon Smith <a href="https://www.wpbf.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a> to local West Palm Beach ABC affiliate WPBF.
Smith describes momentarily losing sight of the plane, but said it then &#8220;came back — it was looking like maybe it was going toward the [nearby Boca Raton] airport.&#8221;
&#8220;I just saw it drop below the trees&#8221; and &#8220;heard a boom,&#8221; Smith said. The office windows shook violently and he saw a &#8220;fireball.”
Footage taken after the incident shows the plane’s wreckage situated on railroad tracks adjacent to a heavily traveled roadway.
The flames ignited by the crash were extinguished by first responders, who arrived on the scene to address both the blaze and assist the injured driver.
Authorities confirmed that the individual in the vehicle was transported to a medical facility with non-life-threatening injuries.
Investigators from the FAA and the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) are <a href="https://x.com/NTSB_Newsroom/status/1910762941743276075">reviewing</a> data from the flight and examining the wreckage to determine why the plane experienced difficulties shortly after taking off.
Local officials have also cordoned off a wide area around the crash site to collect further evidence and ensure there are no additional safety threats.
“We are deeply saddened to confirm that a plane crash occurred earlier today within our community. At this time, details are still emerging, and we are working closely with emergency responders and authorities,” Boca Raton Mayor Scott Singer <a href="https://apnews.com/article/small-plane-crash-florida-boca-raton-84f2a5d7874a4daaeaafd92d2295b974?taid=67f94feb645bb30001316a84&amp;utm_campaign=TrueAnthem&amp;utm_medium=AP&amp;utm_source=Twitter">said</a> in a statement. “Our thoughts are with all those affected by this tragic event. We ask for patience and respect for the families involved as investigations continue.”

US-NEWS-FLA-BOCA-RATON-PLANE-CRASH-FL

Small Plane Crashes On Busy Florida Road, Killing All Three On Board

Air Travel

Federal Aviation Administration (FAA)

General

Plane Crash

U.S.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said he would investigate after a report alleged that a top DEI activist offered minority air traffic controller candidates a way to cheat on the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) entry exam.
In an audio clip from 2014 obtained by <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14459979/listen-audio-DEI-sharing-answers-air-traffic-control-entry-exam.html?ns_mchannel=rss&amp;ns_campaign=1490&amp;ito=social-twitter_mailonline" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Mail</a>, Shelton Snow of the National Black Coalition of Federal Aviation Employees (NBCFAE), who has served as an air traffic operations supervisor based out of New York, was recorded telling prospective hires, “There are some valuable pieces of information that I have taken a screenshot of and I am going to send that to you via email. &#8230; I am about 99.99 percent sure that it is exactly how you need to answer each question.”
A former NBCFAE member, Matthew Douglas, informed The Daily Mail, “I know several people who cheated and I know several people who are controlling planes as we speak.”
“The inside info was made available in 2014 to African Americans, females, and other minority candidates – but whites were left out of the loop to &#8216;minimize competition,’&#8221; the news outlet added.
“I am launching a full investigation into the DEI hiring allegations at the FAA immediately. If true, swift accountability will come for those responsible. We need the best and brightest, not buzzword, DEI hires,” Duffy stated on X.
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I am launching a full investigation into the DEI hiring allegations at the FAA immediately.
If true, swift accountability will come for those responsible. We need the best and brightest, not buzzword, DEI hires. <a href="https://t.co/CTW75umVb5">https://t.co/CTW75umVb5</a>
&mdash; Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) <a href="https://twitter.com/SecDuffy/status/1900211640525873380?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 13, 2025</a></blockquote>
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“Until 2013, the FAA gave hiring preference to controller applicants who earned a degree from one of its Collegiate Training Initiative schools and scored high enough on an eight-hour screening test called the Air Traffic Selection and Training exam, or AT-SAT, which measures cognitive skills. The Obama administration, however, determined that the process excluded too many from minority groups,” Jason Riley of the Manhattan Institute <a href="https://manhattan.institute/article/affirmative-action-lands-in-the-air-traffic-control-tower">commented</a> in 2015.
By 2014, the FAA started using a biographical questionnaire to test prospective candidates, with questions such as, “How many sports did you play in high school?” and “What has been the major cause of your failures?”
Referring to the 2014 entry test, The Daily Mail <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-14399413/FAA-air-traffic-control-hiring-process-quiz-DEI-targets.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reported</a>, “A job questionnaire for aspiring air traffic controllers introduced by the Obama administration was designed to meet secret DEI target numbers.”
Within days of his inauguration in January, President Donald Trump signed an <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/fact-sheets/2025/01/fact-sheet-president-donald-j-trump-ends-dei-madness-and-restores-excellence-and-safety-within-the-federal-aviation-administration/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">executive memorandum</a> “terminating a Biden Administration Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) hiring policy that prioritized diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) over safety and efficiency.”

Sec. Duffy Speaks On NTSB Report On The Mid-Air Collision Near National Airport

Transportation Sec Duffy Looking Into Whether DEI Activist Helped Minorities Cheat On FAA Entry Exam

cheating

Department of Transportation

Politics

Sean Duffy

Social Issues

Elon Musk&#8217;s Starlink satellite internet service has emerged as a potential solution for the Federal Aviation Administration&#8217;s aging air traffic control systems, with the agency testing the technology even as Democratic lawmakers raised conflict of interest concerns.
Starlink’s internet terminals are being <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/starlink-faa-contract-elon-musk-conflict-of-interest/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">tested</a> at multiple FAA sites for a possible air traffic control upgrade, according to CBS News.
Starlink appears poised to take over the $2 billion contract given to telecom provider Verizon in 2023, with Verizon tasked with implementing fiber optic cables to replace the aging, ground-based communications system currently in place.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has confirmed that the agency is reviewing various proposals, but said no final decisions have been made.
Earlier this week, Elon Musk criticized the existing air traffic control network, posting on X that the “Verizon system is not working and so is putting air travelers at serious risk.”
Soon after, he clarified that the “ancient system” he was referring to was created by defense contractor L3Harris and that Verizon’s new replacement technology is “not yet operational.”
Verizon spokesman Kevin Israel told reporters that the company is “working on building the next generation system for the FAA,” adding that they are “at the beginning of a multiyear contract to replace antiquated, legacy systems.”
Bloomberg News reported that Musk recently approved the shipment of 4,000 Starlink terminals to the FAA for potential testing, citing an individual familiar with the matter.
Some Democrats are concerned that this represents a conflict of interest for the administration, as Musk is heavily involved in the administration and donated more than a quarter billion dollars to the Trump 2024 campaign.
“How much richer will Elon get with an FAA contract to another one of his companies? My ELON MUSK Act would stop this blatant corruption,” Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) wrote on X.
However, the FAA clarified in a Monday statement that they have been testing Starlink satellites “since the prior administration to increase reliability at remote sites.”

In this photo illustration a Starlink logo of a satellite

FAA Tests Musk’s Starlink Satellites For Air Traffic Control Upgrades

Airplane

Elon Musk

SpaceX

Technology

It&#8217;s not easy to find a lot of people who are willing to go back and revisit the early days of Barack Obama&#8217;s presidency. Conservatives don&#8217;t want to relive the whole nightmare, for obvious reasons. And for their part, Democrats would rather move on, too. They don&#8217;t particularly want to dwell on Obama&#8217;s &#8220;Russian reset,&#8221; for example, where he told us that Vladimir Putin wasn&#8217;t really a bad guy. That kind of thinking isn&#8217;t exactly compatible with Democrats&#8217; current narrative. Nor are Democrats interested in reminding anyone of Obama&#8217;s promise to lower healthcare costs, or his promise to close Guantanamo Bay, or his promise to stop the weather from changing, and so on. So if there&#8217;s bipartisan agreement on anything, it&#8217;s that Obama&#8217;s presidency isn&#8217;t worth talking about anymore.
But there is one moment from the early Obama years that&#8217;s suddenly become relevant again. I&#8217;m talking about the crash of a Colgan Air passenger plane, which was flying under the brand name of Continental Airlines. The crash occurred in February of 2009, just a month after Obama&#8217;s inauguration. It was the fourth in a string of crashes involving regional airliners from 2005 to 2009. 50 people died, including one person on the ground. An investigation revealed that the pilots — one man and one woman — were overworked and underpaid. They were also objectively bad pilots, at least on that particular night. They weren&#8217;t paying attention to their instruments, to the point that they stalled their plane while on approach for landing. And then, when the aircraft warned them of the stall, they panicked and turned a bad situation into a catastrophe.
In the wake of that crash, the Obama administration mandated a series of changes that, taken together, amount to a major overhaul of the entire aviation industry. One of the big changes was that all pilots — whether they flew for a regional carrier or a major airline — needed to have hundreds of hours of additional training before they could be certified. Pilots were also entitled to more rest breaks. There were several other new regulations, too. And for the most part, no one objected. It was a pretty uncontroversial move. After all, when planes are crashing all over the place, it makes sense to require better training and more rest for the pilots.
But all of these new regulations created a new problem. Airlines that were already struggling with a pilot shortage began having even more difficulty finding enough pilots to fly their routes. In an industry that was concerned with safety, the solution to this problem is obvious: you can either raise salaries to attract more pilots, or you can cut down on flights. But the aviation industry, with the encouragement of the Obama administration, decided on a different approach: They began appealing to so-called &#8220;diverse&#8221; applicants and adopted a much more lax, carefree workplace culture. Just like the FAA, which lowered standards to attract different demographics, airlines created programs to attract women and racial minorities. Then, after the COVID mandates decimated the aviation industry like so many others, these efforts went into overdrive.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/mws-ep-1540-member-exclusive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Matt Walsh Show</a></h3>
The defenders of these diversity initiatives insisted that standards weren&#8217;t being compromised. They argued that the pool of applicants was being expanded, but that all pilots were still competent. They maintained that line of argument even after an Amazon cargo plane operated by Atlas Air crashed in 2019 while landing in Houston, when the pilot inexplicably steered the plane directly into the water. An investigation revealed that the pilot, a man from the Caribbean nation of Antigua named Conrad Aska, had repeatedly failed flight training, but was promoted anyway. His family even sued Amazon, alleging that Conrad Aska never should&#8217;ve been allowed into the cockpit, based on his sheer incompetence. But both Amazon and Atlas Air — which repeatedly preached about the importance of diversity — had no problem handing Conrad Aska the keys to a wide-body Boeing cargo plane.
The defenders of diversity initiatives also downplayed the crash of Southwest Airlines Flight 345, which suffered a landing-gear collapse while landing at La Guardia in 2013. The whole plane was totaled; it was a $15 million loss. Several people were seriously injured. This is a crash you probably haven&#8217;t heard much about, even though given recent events, it&#8217;s once again very relevant. 
This is footage taken by a passenger onboard Southwest Flight 345. It shows the moment the front landing gear collapsed as soon as the plane touched the ground after a very rapid descent. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="003 LaGuardia crash" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/MiQT0nJtQ30?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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An investigation revealed that the captain of this flight was a woman who had multiple complaints filed against her by her co-pilots. In this instance, she allowed the plane to descend rapidly towards the ground without properly configuring the flaps for landing. And then, when she knew the plane was going too fast, she didn&#8217;t abort the landing. Instead, she ordered the first officer to &#8220;get down,&#8221; and then she aggressively took control of the plane herself and flew it, nose-first, into the runway.
So how was a pilot this incompetent allowed to serve as a captain ferrying passengers around on a jetliner? A few weeks ago, I received a tip from a pilot at Southwest who told me that this particular captain was notorious for inappropriate and dangerous behavior in the cockpit. A lot of pilots didn&#8217;t want to fly with her. The captain, for her part, thought the complaints were really about her gender or her sexuality, instead of her competence. And apparently, Southwest agreed.
This was not a widely reported episode, for the simple reason that it&#8217;s extremely inconvenient to proponents of so-called &#8220;diversity&#8221; in aviation. We&#8217;re required to believe that diversity improves the functioning of every organization, whether it&#8217;s Harvard University or Southwest Airlines. So most media outlets buried the story. They kept the identity of the woman pilot confidential, even after Southwest finally terminated her employment following the crash. Very few news reports mentioned her gender at all, or any other identifying information about her. They did the same thing with Conrad Aska and many other pilots. They just didn&#8217;t talk about them.
For a while, this strategy worked. Diversity initiatives continued for many years without any interruption, across all major airlines. But the problem, of course, is that you can&#8217;t downplay airline crashes forever. Eventually the crashes become more noticeable. Eventually people start dying, and not just in cargo planes. And at that point — which is the point we&#8217;ve now reached — the toll of diversity becomes harder and harder to deny. And then people will do the rational thing. They&#8217;ll start looking more closely at what exactly is going on in the aviation industry. And in particular, they&#8217;ll start looking at who exactly is flying the aircraft that keep crashing.
First, of course, there was the disastrous mid-air collision that was apparently caused, at least in part, by a female Black Hawk pilot near Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. This pilot was clearly flying too high, for reasons that aren&#8217;t clear. She also failed to see a jet that was directly in her path. Based on the most recent <a href="https://www.ntsb.gov/investigations/Documents/Feb.14.2025_Briefing_Mid-air_Collision%20near%20DCA.pdf" target="_blank" rel="noopener">information</a> we have from the NTSB, it&#8217;s clear that, about three minutes before the collision, the Black Hawk pilot was warned by her instructor that she was flying 100 feet too high for the area they were flying in. She was also warned about the passenger jet by air traffic control, which also provided the passenger jet&#8217;s location, well over a minute before impact. But she never took any evasive action whatsoever. The pilots of the American Airlines plane put their plane into a maximum nose-up climb just one second before impact, so clearly they eventually saw something. But the woman flying the Black Hawk never did.
Then, earlier this week, we all witnessed the Endeavor Air crash at Toronto&#8217;s airport.
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🚨 JUST IN: Delta Air Lines is now offering a $30,000 payoff to victims of their plane crash, just two days after it occurred
Are they trying to pay people off to get ahead of the impending DEI pilot revelations?
Delta &amp; operator Endeavor, famous for their “all female crews,”… <a href="https://t.co/HBtEVXtxoH">pic.twitter.com/HBtEVXtxoH</a>
&mdash; Nick Sortor (@nicksortor) <a href="https://twitter.com/nicksortor/status/1892355772580806811?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 19, 2025</a></blockquote>
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The plane clearly came in too quickly, just like the Southwest Airlines jet that I mentioned earlier. And then the landing gear collapsed and the plane flipped over. Based on air traffic control audio, it appears that one pilot — the one who was presumably handling the radios, instead of flying the plane — was a male. But we still don&#8217;t have the identity of the pilot who was actually flying the plane. Reports from various sources online, citing tips from airline pilots and firefighters at Toronto&#8217;s airport, suggest that the pilot who was flying was a woman. But we don&#8217;t know for sure because no one in the government, or at Delta Airlines, will tell us.
If it&#8217;s true, that wouldn&#8217;t exactly be a surprise. Endeavor Air and Delta have gone out of their way in recent years to advertise how many female pilots they have. They&#8217;ve also done a full-court press to attract more female applicants. In fact, as you may have seen, Endeavor&#8217;s official TikTok and X accounts are obsessed with the idea of so-called &#8220;unmanned flights,&#8221; where no men are in the crew. So they&#8217;re not just pro-women; they&#8217;re actively anti-men. And if I&#8217;m being honest, whoever&#8217;s putting together Endeavor&#8217;s social media posts seems to have a sense of humor about the situation. Here for example is one recent tweet from Endeavor:
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Buckle up ladies and gentlemen, your flight is unmanned today. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/girlpower?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#girlpower</a>
📸: Caitlyn M., FO, CRJ-900 <a href="https://t.co/vL7ec2P3fX">pic.twitter.com/vL7ec2P3fX</a>
&mdash; Endeavor Air (@EndeavorAir) <a href="https://twitter.com/EndeavorAir/status/1533886722286788610?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 6, 2022</a></blockquote>
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On the surface, I guess this is supposed to be an empowering, girlboss message. If that&#8217;s the case, then why does it begin with the warning, &#8220;Buckle up&#8221;? It&#8217;s like going to a restaurant where they tell you, &#8220;Enjoy your food presented by an all-female kitchen. Hope you brought a bucket!” It&#8217;s almost like whoever&#8217;s writing this post knows something we don&#8217;t. 
And then there&#8217;s this now-infamous TikTok footage from Endeavor Air, featuring a few more girlbosses. Some of these clips are so on-the-nose that it seems like they were prepared by a male intern somewhere who&#8217;s tired of all the DEI initiatives, and he was trying to find some desperate way to communicate that message without losing his internship in the process. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="006 Endeavor women" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/nQXNKZObNus?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
Yes, the lyrics there are, &#8220;Live fast, die young, bad girls do it well.&#8221; That&#8217;s what you hear after you read the caption, &#8220;Leave the flying to the men? I don&#8217;t think so.&#8221; Again, this is the official messaging of an airline that&#8217;s supposedly committed to safety and competence. They want you to know that you&#8217;ll have an all-female flight crew that loves to &#8220;live fast and die young.” That is just about the worst possible mantra for an airline pilot.
When I looked at the rest of Endeavor&#8217;s TikTok account, I found that these clips are not rare exceptions to the norm. Quite the opposite. Pretty much every single post involves women dancing or miming the words to a song of some kind. It&#8217;s like a sorority&#8217;s TikTok channel, instead of the official social media account of a company that&#8217;s responsible for ferrying thousands of passengers across the sky at high speeds in aluminum tubes every single day.
Here&#8217;s just a small selection of what I&#8217;m talking about:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="007 Endeavor TikToks" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/q94keOak1gQ?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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It&#8217;s like they&#8217;re running an adult daycare. They&#8217;re not even pretending to convey the idea that they&#8217;re serious people who should be entrusted with your life.
The description for Endeavor Air&#8217;s account on TikTok reads, &#8220;CR-slay everyday&#8221; — which I assume is a reference to the CRJ aircraft that they fly. This is how you would present your company if you wanted to attract the ditziest, least responsible and least intelligent applicants imaginable. And based on recent events, it seems like that&#8217;s exactly what Endeavor got.
But as easy as it would be to blame this on Endeavor, which is a relatively small subsidiary of Delta, the truth is that this is a much deeper problem. It goes to the top. And to illustrate that, here&#8217;s footage from the pinned tweet of Delta Airlines&#8217; main account at the time of the Endeavor Air crash. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="008 Delta slay" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Zyb1SUAG7Vk?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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So this whole &#8220;slay&#8221; concept is apparently a big deal at both Endeavor and Delta. They think it&#8217;s a really important message to communicate. They&#8217;re girlbosses who &#8220;slay.&#8221; Of course, &#8220;slay&#8221; means &#8220;to kill.&#8221; And that&#8217;s what you can expect to happen now when you board these planes, evidently. They&#8217;ll slay you. With their flying skills.
As painful as this footage is, I will give Delta some credit. Yesterday, in an interview with CBS, Delta&#8217;s CEO was given an opportunity to blame Donald Trump for the crash in Toronto. Yes, the corporate press is going with the narrative that Donald Trump is responsible for a pilot&#8217;s terrible crash landing in a foreign country. And in response to this setup, the Delta CEO immediately shot the question down, which led to a pretty entertaining facial expression from the CBS anchor. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="009 Delta trump CBS" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZYUEHi_F0gQ?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
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Notice there&#8217;s no question from CBS about the identity of the pilot, or her qualifications, or whether Endeavor regrets posting nonstop music video TikToks for the past five years. Instead the question is about how Donald Trump is to blame. This has been the approach of so many establishment interests ever since the aviation industry began experiencing a series of crashes more than a decade ago. They deflect and they minimize responsibility, all while insisting that the underlying system is working fine.
But with every major airline disaster, these deflections become less and less effective. The more they hide information about who&#8217;s flying these planes, the more people will come to realize what&#8217;s actually going on. And at a certain point — a point that&#8217;s rapidly approaching — no one will fly on a plane unless they know who&#8217;s flying it. People will demand thorough reviews of pilots, like they demand reviews of restaurants before making a reservation. That won&#8217;t be a sustainable model for most airlines. But for people who want to fly with some peace of mind — free from the complete and total incompetence that Obama-era diversity initiatives have wrought, so many years later— it&#8217;ll be the only option worth considering.

Pensive dark-haired woman co-pilot seated in the cockpit

Girlbossing The Airline Industry — Straight Into The Ground

Airline Crash

Airlines

Delta Airlines

Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI)

Matt Walsh

Obama Administration

Opinion

Southwest Airlines

Women

Delta Airlines CEO Ed Bastian pushed back this week on claims from the political Left that President Donald Trump&#8217;s cuts to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) will impact air travel safety.
The comments from Bastian come after one of Delta&#8217;s planes was involved in an accident in Toronto this week during landing. The plane&#8217;s rear landing gear snapped upon impact, causing the plane&#8217;s wing to clip the ground and the jetliner to flip over.
Bastian appeared on &#8220;CBS Mornings&#8221; on Wednesday to address the recent plane crash at Toronto-Pearson International Airport, where a Delta flight from Minneapolis overturned while landing at the Canadian airport.
&#8220;Do those cuts worry you and do you think that impacts safety?&#8221; CBS News host Gayle King asked Bastian on &#8220;CBS Mornings.&#8221; &#8220;Do these cuts affect you?&#8221;
&#8220;The cuts do not affect us, Gayle,&#8221; Bastian responded. &#8220;I&#8217;ve been in close communication with the Secretary of Transportation. I understand that the cuts at this time are something that are raising questions, but the reality is there&#8217;s over 50,000 people that work at the FAA. And the cuts, I understand, were 300 people, and they were in non-critical safety functions.&#8221;
&#8220;The Trump administration has committed to investing deeply in terms of improving the overall technologies that are used in the air traffic control systems and modernizing the skies,&#8221; he continued. &#8220;They&#8217;ve committed to hiring additional controllers and investigators, and safety investigators. So no, I&#8217;m not concerned with that at all.&#8221;
WATCH:
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CBS&#8217;s Gayle King tries to blame Trump for the plane crashes, is debunked by Delta&#8217;s CEO <a href="https://t.co/P9m5SxYKOQ">pic.twitter.com/P9m5SxYKOQ</a>
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) <a href="https://twitter.com/EndWokeness/status/1892275303889719529?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 19, 2025</a></blockquote>
Bastian said that the crew responded appropriately to the accident, which pilots continuously train to be prepared for.
“This is what we train for,” Bastian insisted. “We train for this continuously.”
He added that despite the accident last month in Washington, D.C., and some smaller crashes since then, flying remains “the safest form of transportation, period.”

Utah Scenics

Delta’s CEO Pushes Back On Claims That Cuts To FAA Will Impact Safety Of Air Travel

Airplane crash

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer predicted that President Donald Trump and the Department Of Government Efficiency (DOGE) would bring about more plane crashes, suggesting that the president was fine with putting lives at risk as long as he could secure more tax breaks for billionaires.
Schumer delivered remarks from the Senate floor on Wednesday, saying that because Trump and billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk were responsible for cutting positions within the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), they were necessarily driving up the risk for more crashes — and he claimed they were doing it &#8220;so they can help their billionaire buddies with another tax break.&#8221;
WATCH:
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🚨NEW: Chuck Schumer continues attempts to link Trump and DOGE to plane crashes — 
— says cuts to FAA endanger safety, so ‘billionaires’ can enrich themselves:
&quot;At a time when incidents in the air and on the runways in and our airports seem to be increasing, why would we cut… <a href="https://t.co/fzVLA9ul0q">pic.twitter.com/fzVLA9ul0q</a>
&mdash; Western Lensman (@WesternLensman) <a href="https://twitter.com/WesternLensman/status/1892254295111630966?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 19, 2025</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
&#8220;The more Donald Trump and DOGE indiscriminately hack away at public agencies, the greater harm to Americans&#8217; well-being and even their safety,&#8221; Schumer claimed. &#8220;The FAA is a good example. Just weeks after the deadliest plane crash in a long time, and just as we see more incidents around the country, President Trump has fired hundreds of FAA workers including air safety personnel.&#8221;
&#8220;Firing people whose very job it is to keep air travel safe is nothing short of reckless,&#8221; Schumer continued.
&#8220;At a time when incidents in the air and on the runways in and our airports seem to be increasing, why would we cut the very people meant to prevent them?&#8221; Schumer asked before posing an answer to his own question. &#8220;Simple. Donald Trump and DOGE are doing it like they&#8217;re doing so much else, so they can help their billionaire buddies with another tax break.&#8221;
Transportation Secretary <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hillary-clinton-snipes-at-doge-but-sean-duffy-gives-her-no-quarter-you-need-to-sit-this-one-out" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Sean Duffy</a>, who was confirmed to his new post just 24 hours prior to the deadly crash near Reagan National Airport, stated early on that he was ready to work with DOGE to make transportation more efficient and safer — and also said that staffing cuts and federal worker buyout offers would not extend to air traffic controllers.

Democratic Congressional Leaders Reveal Proposals To Combat Trump, DOGE “Chaos”

Schumer Predicts More Plane Crashes Due To Trump, DOGE — Claims It’s About Tax Cuts For Billionaires

Schumer Predicts More Plane Crashes Due To Trump, DOGE — Claims It's About Tax Cuts For Billionaires

Chuck Schumer

Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

Donald Trump

At least two people were killed Wednesday morning when two small planes collided midair near an airport in southern Arizona, local authorities said.
According to a statement from the Federal Aviation Administration, “two people were aboard each plane involved in the collision,” The Associated Press <a href="https://apnews.com/article/arizona-small-plane-collision-763524e34ee9f1b9315b30121f3ec584">reported</a>. Authorities in Marana, located about 25 miles northwest of Tucson, confirmed at least two fatalities.
The airport has no air traffic control tower but was planning to construct one before pandemic-related setbacks caused delays. The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating the crash but has not yet provided details on whether airfield infrastructure issues or other factors played a role.
Authorities have also not confirmed whether weather or mechanical failures contributed to the collision. Additional updates, including the identities of the victims, are pending as law enforcement continues notifying the individuals’ families. Local agencies have urged anyone with firsthand information to contact them directly, emphasizing that witness accounts can help piece together what led to the midair collision.
This week’s incident marks the second fatal crash in Arizona within a short span. Last week, one of two pilots died on a private jet in Scottsdale owned by Mötley Crüe singer Vince Neil after the aircraft went off the runway and collided with a business jet.
The tragedy is one of four in just the last month, including a Delta aircraft that overturned upon landing in Toronto and a commuter plane in Alaska that crashed in remote terrain.
In January, a fatal collision involving an American Airlines passenger plane and an Army helicopter in Washington, D.C., claimed 67 lives, while the next day saw the crash of a medical transport flight in Philadelphia that killed seven and injured 19 others.

American Airlines Plane And Black Hawk Helicopter Crash Near Reagan National Airport

Midair Plane Collision In Arizona Kills At Least Two

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt blasted Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on Tuesday after he blamed President Donald Trump&#8217;s government cuts for the Delta Air Lines crash-landing in Toronto earlier this week.
Schumer <a href="https://x.com/SenSchumer/status/1891646582082167166?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1891646582082167166%7Ctwgr%5E67fe56231bf46cf6d604ca71a05331f7b2a6d811%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&amp;ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.foxnews.com%2Fmedia%2Fkaroline-leavitt-gives-fact-check-sen-schumer-blames-trump-upside-down-delta-plane-crash-toronto" target="_blank" rel="noopener">posted</a> on X on Monday shortly after the crash, writing, &#8220;Trump’s doing massive layoffs at the FAA—including safety specialists—and making our skies less and less safe.&#8221; In a follow-up post, Schumer added, &#8220;To those asking whether it matters that the plane’s destination was in Canada: The flight took off from Minneapolis. The FAA was still responsible for inspecting the aviation equipment, and Trump just let go of FAA safety specialists.&#8221;
Leavitt responded to Schumer&#8217;s criticism of the Trump administration, telling <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/media/karoline-leavitt-gives-fact-check-sen-schumer-blames-trump-upside-down-delta-plane-crash-toronto?intcmp=tw_fnc" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fox News</a>, &#8220;It’s incredibly irresponsible for Chuck Schumer to say such a thing when the investigation is still underway.&#8221; She then pointed out that the &#8220;crash unfortunately took place in Canadian airspace with Canadian air traffic controllers overseeing it.&#8221; According to Leavitt, no air traffic controllers have been fired during Trump&#8217;s purge of the FAA. She added that the Trump administration &#8220;has put great emphasis on hiring the best and the brightest air-traffic controllers who want to be part of the FAA.&#8221;
The response from the White House Press Secretary prompted another social media <a href="https://x.com/SenSchumer/status/1892214482887152100" target="_blank" rel="noopener">post</a> from Schumer, who wrote, &#8220;Here are the facts: This flight took off from Minneapolis. The FAA was still responsible for inspecting the aviation equipment, and Trump just fired FAA safety specialists.&#8221; He added, &#8220;The Trump administration turns away from the facts, and it’s hurting Americans. Democrats are fighting to protect the flying public.&#8221;
The Professional Aviation Safety Specialists union, which represents FAA and Department of Defense employees, said earlier this week that the Trump administration fired hundreds of FAA probationary workers, including systems specialists, safety inspectors, and maintenance mechanics. The reported firings came after Trump <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/trump-initiates-review-of-all-faa-workers-in-critical-safety-positions" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ordered</a> a review of all FAA “critical safety positions” to &#8220;ensure top-notch air safety and efficiency.&#8221;
Authorities have not determined the cause of the crash-landing in Toronto as Canadian and U.S. officials team up on the investigation. Video footage showed the regional jet hit the runway at an odd angle before its right main landing gear snapped off. The plane&#8217;s right wing smashed into the ground and the aircraft turned upside down and burst into flames. All 80 people on board, including 76 passengers and four crew members, survived, with 21 requiring medical attention.
Authorities will look into factors that could have led to the crash, including the weather and the pilots&#8217; experience and training. A retired Delta captain told <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/bad-weather-or-human-error-retired-airline-captain-breaks-down-delta-crash" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Daily Wire</a> on Tuesday that he does &#8220;not believe that weather was a factor.&#8221;
&#8220;Most likely from what I gathered yesterday at the time of the incident, the wind was approximately 40 degrees from center, so the crosswind component was around 20 knots and the headwind was around 23,&#8221; he said, adding, &#8220;Any pilot should be able to handle that. It’s no big deal.&#8221;
Delta Air Lines CEO Ed Bastian <a href="https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/delta-ceo-says-flight-crew-125242104.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">told</a> &#8220;CBS Mornings&#8221; on Wednesday that the crew on Delta&#8217;s Endeavor Air CRJ-900 was experienced, adding, &#8220;All these pilots train for these conditions.&#8221; Bastian also praised the crew for quickly evacuating everyone on the plane.

Chuck Schumer/Karoline Leavitt

Leavitt, Schumer Trade Barbs After Dem Leader Blames Trump For Delta Crash-Landing

Air and Space

Karoline Leavitt

Toronto

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy slammed his predecessor, Pete Buttigieg, this week on social media as Buttigieg tried to imply that recent government cutbacks could have led to plane crashes that have occurred since the Trump administration took over.
&#8220;The flying public needs answers,&#8221; Buttigieg <a href="https://x.com/PeteButtigieg/status/1891486255889731993">posted</a> on X on Monday. &#8220;How many FAA personnel were just fired? What positions? And why?&#8221;
His post comes as there have been several recent plane crashes, including a commercial airliner that collided with a helicopter in Washington, D.C., late last month.
&#8220;Mayor Pete failed for four years to address the air traffic controller shortage and upgrade our outdated, World War II-era air traffic control system,&#8221; Duffy responded. &#8220;In less than four weeks, we have already begun the process and are engaging the smartest minds in the entire world.&#8221;
&#8220;Here’s the truth: the FAA alone has a staggering 45,000 employees,&#8221; he continued. &#8220;Less than 400 were let go, and they were all probationary, meaning they had been hired less than a year ago. Zero air traffic controllers and critical safety personnel were let go.&#8221;
Duffy said that Buttigieg used the Department of Transportation as &#8220;a slush fund for the green new scam and environmental justice nonsense.&#8221;
&#8220;Not to mention that over 90% of the workforce under his leadership were working from home &#8211; including him. The building was empty!&#8221; he continued. &#8220;When we finally get a full accounting of his mismanagement, I look forward to hearing from him.&#8221;
Buttigieg&#8217;s criticisms of Duffy come as he is considering a run for U.S. Senate in Michigan following the unexpected retirement of Sen. Gary Peters (D-MI), who said last month that he would not run for re-election in 2026.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Mayor Pete failed for four years to address the air traffic controller shortage and upgrade our outdated, World War II-era air traffic control system. In less than four weeks, we have already begun the process and are engaging the smartest minds in the entire world.
Here’s the… <a href="https://t.co/LCL1dswC2T">https://t.co/LCL1dswC2T</a>
— Secretary Sean Duffy (@SecDuffy) <a href="https://twitter.com/SecDuffy/status/1891656952662405304?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">February 18, 2025</a></blockquote>

Senate Commerce, Science, And Transportation Committee Holds Confirmation Hearing For Sean Duffy

Sean Duffy Shreds Pete Buttigieg Over Problems At FAA

Pete Buttigieg

Transportation

Questions continue to abound in this horrifying tragedy outside Reagan National Airport, where an American Airlines flight coming from Wichita, Kansas, was struck by a Black Hawk helicopter.
Was this an air traffic control problem? Was this a pilot error issue? All of that is still very much up in the air. There have been near-misses in the past.
A lot of people are now asking why Black Hawk helicopters are operating at night in an area where passenger jets are taking off and landing.
Apparently, near-misses of this sort tend to happen a lot more often than expected. According to <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/us/pilots-recall-problems-washington-airport-after-fatal-crash-2025-01-30/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Reuters</a>, “U.S. commercial pilot Rick Redfern was preparing to land at Reagan Washington National Airport about a decade ago when he spotted a bright red Coast Guard helicopter hovering about 50 feet (15 m) above the Potomac River. Air traffic control promptly warned the helicopter pilot to stay clear, and Redfern said he used evasive maneuvers to avoid it and avert a potential disaster &#8211; and that was in daytime, when visibility was clearer.”
It&#8217;s almost unthinkable that this even happened, considering how sophisticated our machinery is now and how sophisticated our ability is to see planes in the air — even at night.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/bss-ep-2129-member-exclusive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Ben Shapiro Show</a></h3>
But to attribute it to anything other than an accident at this point would be to move beyond the available evidence; it&#8217;s unclear what caused the crash. Apparently, the black boxes have been recovered, so we&#8217;ll have a better window into what was going on aboard the two aircraft before they collided. Army secretary nominee Daniel Driscoll said during a Senate hearing that the crash may prompt the military to reconsider conducting training operations near the Washington, DC airspace.
Yesterday, when President Trump spoke to the press, he brought up the DEI policies of the Obama and Biden administrations that he felt had weakened the air traffic control systems. 
That suggestion made Democrats insane. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), for example, slammed Trump for speculating about DEI issues.
You could make the case that President Trump shouldn&#8217;t be talking about DEI and the FAA until we have more details, but I think what Schumer really objected to was the idea that DEI is bad at all. Like all Democrats, he tends to think DEI is good. And it pervaded every aspect of the Biden administration.
As The Washington Times <a href="https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2025/jan/30/faa-diversity-hiring-practices-scrutiny-long-air-d/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">noted</a>:
<blockquote>Years before Wednesday’s fatal collision between a military helicopter and a passenger jet approaching Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, critics warned that the Obama and Biden administrations had jeopardized safety by prioritizing diversity, equity and inclusion at the Federal Aviation Administration. &#8230;
Critics warned that the FAA’s focus on DEI diverted time and resources from air travel safety. It hobbled the agency as it grappled with air traffic controller shortages, antiquated monitoring equipment and an increase in near misses on crowded airport runways, they said. An unidentified source told The Associated Press on Thursday that the air traffic controller in charge of monitoring the airspace at the time of the fatal collision was performing the work of two people.</blockquote>
In other words, because they couldn&#8217;t get enough “diverse members” in the FAA, they were simply under-hiring. That meant that they were short-staffed during critical times.
The Times continued:
<blockquote>Air safety concerns prompted 11 Republican attorneys general to write to FAA Administrator Michael Whitaker last year to question the administration’s hiring practices and priorities. “Unfortunately, the Biden FAA, under your administration, appears to prioritize virtue-signaling ‘diversity’ efforts over aviation expertise. And this calls into question the agency’s commitment to safety,”</blockquote>
That is not wrong. It is true that the Obama and Biden administrations prioritized DEI over safety. The Times added:
<blockquote>The Biden-era FAA website, now scrubbed, said, “The FAA’s mission involves securing the skies of a diverse nation. It only makes sense that the workforce responsible for that mission reflects the nation.” In 2022, the FAA pledged to “diversify its workforce by rethinking its hiring practices,” and administration officials assigned long-term goals to amplify diversity, accessibility and LGBTQ issues. A 2022 performance target required that the agency “host a national symposium with internal and external stakeholders to socialize efforts on the use of gender-neutral language at FAA.” &#8230;
In 2013, the FAA started using a “biographical assessment” to increase the hiring of preferred minority racial groups at air traffic control centers. The assessment asked applicants about their participation in school sports &#8230;</blockquote>
One of the questionnaires circulated by the FAA reportedly awarded points for factors such as having the lowest grade in high school in science — which is psychotic.
There is a lot of heartburn on the Left because Trump is suggesting DEI had something to do with this accident. I can&#8217;t name the number of times that Joe Biden came forth right after some sort of school shooting — before any of the evidence was available — to discuss how gun control was obviously the solution.
Here&#8217;s the salient point: It is very clear that the FAA has been operating along these lines for a very long time. Regardless of whether this crash was a result of DEI or not, there is a reason why the blowback is coming in that form.
We&#8217;ll have to wait and see what the cause of this particular plane crash was, but it is certainly the case that procedures have to change. This is why President Trump took executive action yesterday, signing a memorandum to end DEI practices in the aviation sector and to assess aviation safety, as well as issuing an Executive Order to appoint a new head of the FAA.
Regardless of what led to this crash, DEI procedures must change.
Trump is correct about that.

US-POLITICS-TRUMP-AVIATION-ACCIDENT

Trump, DEI, And The FAA

American Airlines

Ben Shapiro

Biden Administration

President Trump

U.S. Army

Washington D.C.

Woke Culture

The more we learn about the mid-air collision involving American Airlines 5342 and a military Black Hawk helicopter on Wednesday night, the more it&#8217;s clear that we can now identify some reasons why this catastrophe happened.
This is something that, in the mainstream press, you&#8217;re not supposed to say out loud. You&#8217;re supposed to believe that we can&#8217;t really know anything about what happened — and that, at a minimum, we should allow a few years&#8217; worth of investigation to take place, before we jump to any conclusions. That&#8217;s certainly the position of CNN, which sent a reporter to the White House briefing yesterday to browbeat Donald Trump because he cast blame on the Black Hawk pilots, DEI and air traffic control. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="006 Trump Against Kaitlan Collins" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/AutwhdX_-ig?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
&nbsp;
We&#8217;ve talked a lot about how Trump is reforming Washington at a very rapid pace, largely with his steady stream of executive orders and executive actions. But one of the most important changes he&#8217;s making is that he&#8217;s introducing accountability to the federal government. He&#8217;s demonstrating that he has no patience for the bureaucratic runaround that allows disasters like this to occur in the first place. The corporate media cannot run interference anymore. They cannot hide what actually happened.
One of the reasons that&#8217;s true is that, in this case, we have primary sources that we can rely on. There are a lot of aviation enthusiasts on platforms like YouTube, and they regularly upload air traffic control data and audio. And those videos paint a pretty clear picture of what took place on Wednesday night. Here for example is a reconstruction of the accident from the account &#8220;VASA Aviation.&#8221; It combines the radar tracking data with audio from air traffic control. In this footage, you&#8217;ll hear the first relevant interaction between the tower at Reagan airport and the Black Hawk helicopter crew. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="007 Visual Seperation" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/saYk_jL2BeI?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
&nbsp;
So the tower says, &#8220;PAT 25, traffic just south of the Woodrow Bridge, a CRJ, it&#8217;s 1200 feet setting up for runway 33.&#8221;
And then comes the response: &#8220;PAT 25 has the traffic in sight, requesting visual separation.&#8221;
And then &#8220;visual separation&#8221; is granted.
This is a key moment. Contrary to what you may have heard in the media, the controller tells the Blackhawk pilot exactly what plane to look out for, and where it is at that exact moment. And the Blackhawk pilot states that he sees the plane at the bridge, and will avoid it.
At this point, everything&#8217;s going normally.
Then, about twenty seconds later, an alarm goes off in the control tower, because the two aircraft are on a collision course. That obviously signals that the Blackhawk pilot may not have followed the instructions. Listen to what happens at that point:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="008 Crash Reaction" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/5q8QY8qVkg4?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
&nbsp;
This time around, the air traffic controller isn&#8217;t very specific. He doesn&#8217;t state where exactly the passenger plane is, he just tells the helicopter pilot to avoid a &#8220;CRJ,&#8221; probably because he assumes they&#8217;re still tracking the same plane he mentioned earlier. He also doesn&#8217;t give the helicopter pilots much time to respond. And then, as you heard, within seconds the two aircraft collided.
So right away, there&#8217;s reason to speculate that maybe the Blackhawk helicopter was somehow looking at the wrong plane. Or maybe the Blackhawk lost sight of the passenger jet at some point, and failed to tell anyone. Either way, it&#8217;s clear that air traffic control&#8217;s guidance in those final seconds was very lacking, to say the least. And on top of that, based on the radar data, the Blackhawk pilots made a series of other mistakes, in addition to failing to see the passenger jet that was right in front of them.
<h3><a href="https://www.dailywire.com/episode/mws-ep-1527-member-exclusive" target="_blank" rel="noopener">WATCH: The Matt Walsh Show</a></h3>
As several aviation analysts have pointed out, the Blackhawk helicopter was supposed to be below 200 feet at this point. That&#8217;s a requirement for all helicopters on that route, at that point, right in front of the runway at DCA. The idea is that they&#8217;ll pass below the arriving traffic at the airport. But in this case, according to the radar data, the helicopter was flying above 300 feet. Additionally, the helicopter appeared to be slightly off course.
According to the published charts for this area, the helicopter was supposed to be hugging the land. Instead, it was over the water. Here&#8217;s how one aviation analyst described the problem:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="009 Recap of Flight Paths" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/jaM9VdRbeik?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
&nbsp;
Late last night, the New York Times <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/live/2025/01/29/us/plane-crash-washington-dc?rsrc=ss&amp;unlocked_article_code=1.tU4.kM9x.An5Rzyh6YvWu&amp;smid=nytcore-ios-share&amp;referringSource=articleShare" target="_blank" rel="noopener">confirmed</a> this analysis: &#8220;The Army Black Hawk was supposed to be flying in a different location and lower when it collided with a passenger jet, according to four people briefed on the matter.&#8221;
So already, we have evidence of serious errors by pretty much everyone involved in this crash, except the American Airlines flight crew. They were in the right place, doing the right thing. The helicopter pilots were apparently too high and off-course, and they clearly failed to spot the plane that was right in front of them. According to the defense secretary, they also had night-vision on, which reduced their field of view. And the air traffic control wasn&#8217;t offering much help.
And that&#8217;s not even scratching the surface of the extent of the failures here. NBC News reports that, according to the FAA, staffing levels were &#8220;not normal&#8221; at the airport at the time of the accident. One controller was handling both inbound planes and helicopters, where normally two controllers split those responsibilities. So this is some of the most congested, critical airspace in the entire country, and we&#8217;re evidently running things at half capacity. How exactly is that possible?
As you might remember, a little over a year ago, I did a few <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6byj8jfZYRA" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v%3D6byj8jfZYRA&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1738441249163000&amp;usg=AOvVaw31SaIoTbIYpw6lfbzff2RU">monologues</a> on the fact that a major aviation disaster was imminent in this country. It got to the point that it felt redundant after a while, because every week, there would be a new series of near-misses. We didn&#8217;t even have time to talk about all of them. In one of these monologues I specifically pointed out that TCAS — the on-board collision avoidance system in most commercial planes — doesn&#8217;t help prevent mid-air collisions when aircraft are close to the ground. It&#8217;s not designed to work below 1,000 feet. So I made the point that there&#8217;s a very high risk of a mid-air collision near the ground. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="010 Matt Predicts More Accidents" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/NThFetmVdVQ?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
I&#8217;m not an aviation expert. I&#8217;m not even a hobbyist. I&#8217;m a high school educated podcaster. But even I knew, more than a year ago, that this was a major risk. Our mid-air collision fail-safes simply do not work at low-altitude. That&#8217;s especially true given that some low-flying aircraft don&#8217;t have TCAS at all, like military Black Hawks.
With that information, you might think that the FAA would consider, say, banning helicopters from flying directly into the approach paths of major airports like Reagan National. But they didn&#8217;t think of that, apparently. Instead, this is the chart that helicopters currently use to fly around DC:
<div class="image"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="size-large wp-image-869635 aligncenter" src="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/01/gbtoHN0-Imgur-629x576.png" alt="" width="629" height="576" srcset="https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/01/gbtoHN0-Imgur-629x576.png 629w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/01/gbtoHN0-Imgur-300x275.png 300w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/01/gbtoHN0-Imgur-768x703.png 768w, https://dw-wp-production.imgix.net/2025/01/gbtoHN0-Imgur.png 1188w" sizes="(max-width: 629px) 100vw, 629px" /></div>
As you can see, they just put the helicopter routes right in front of the airport. Look at how close Route 1 and Route 4 are to the runway. And if there&#8217;s any deviation from those altitudes whatsoever, there&#8217;s a major risk of a catastrophe. Everyone has to be perfectly on their game, at all times, or else there could be a disaster.
But as we know, very often, air traffic controllers are not always on their game. Almost all of the near-disasters I&#8217;ve talked about over the years were potential mid-air collisions caused by incompetent air traffic control. Here&#8217;s one of these near-misses from Reagan National Airport — the same airport where the crash occurred on Wednesday. This is from last April. Watch:
<iframe loading="lazy" title="012 Near Crash on Taxi 1" width="500" height="281" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/0gOkFKYBR8c?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share" referrerpolicy="strict-origin-when-cross-origin" allowfullscreen></iframe>
You can hear the controllers in the tower screaming once they realize their mistake. Again, there was new footage like this every week. That&#8217;s why, in 2023, there were 503 air traffic control lapses that the FAA categorized as &#8220;significant,&#8221; which was a 65% jump year-over-year. I&#8217;ll say that again. &#8220;Significant lapses&#8221; by air traffic controllers increased by 65% in just one year.
It&#8217;s not hard to understand why this might be happening, given all of the evidence of declining standards at the agency. Last year for example I <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qofbS4OFLHM" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v%3DqofbS4OFLHM&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1738441249163000&amp;usg=AOvVaw3-_fGXff2ALW-bdZ1uBm36">published</a> footage and documentation from whistleblowers in the FAA and the aviation industry. And what these whistleblowers made clear is that the FAA (and the airlines) have drastically cut their performance expectations, across the board. Actually, that&#8217;s underselling what happened. The FAA specifically went out of its way to punish white applicants. They introduced a &#8220;biographical questionnaire&#8221; that dinged applicants who had relevant education or experience, knowing that white applicants would be affected the most. In one case, an FAA official was even <a href="https://x.com/tracewoodgrains/status/1752091831095939471" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://x.com/tracewoodgrains/status/1752091831095939471&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1738441249163000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0pCHihEurO-D_MG5RT_Gv_">caught</a> <a href="https://x.com/JoshDehaas/status/1752175942166868312" target="_blank" rel="noopener" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://x.com/JoshDehaas/status/1752175942166868312&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1738441249163000&amp;usg=AOvVaw0CDsU9rBPQmgjlId8PAHDf">helping</a> black employees — and only black employees — to access inside information that would help them in the application process. In the footage I reported on last year, a senior FAA official openly talked about the importance of &#8220;reducing the number of white males&#8221; in the aviation industry.
As increasingly under-qualified air traffic controllers have been promoted, the situation has deteriorated further. And that&#8217;s produced a constant stream of near-misses that continued right up until this disaster. As the Washington Post <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2025/01/30/dc-plane-crash-updates-helicopter-potomac-reagan-airport/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">reports</a>: &#8220;Just 24 hours before the collision of American Eagle Flight 5342 and an Army Black Hawk helicopter near Reagan National Airport on Wednesday, another jet trying to land there had to make a second approach after a helicopter appeared near its flight path.&#8221;
So that&#8217;s what we know. Airlines and the FAA deliberately lower standards and then near misses dramatically increase. No one does anything about it, or takes preventative measures of any kind. And then we have an inevitable crash.
Based on those facts, do we know for sure that if DEI were never invented as a concept, then this accident would never have happened? No, we don’t. Based on the information we have right now, we can&#8217;t say that with certainty. One of the Black Hawk pilots was reportedly a woman with just 500 hours of experience, but we don&#8217;t yet know whether she was handling the controls at the time of the crash — although that seems likely, since her male co-pilot was doing the radio calls. But we still don&#8217;t know the full extent of her qualifications, or anything else.
At the same time, as Donald Trump outlined yesterday, that&#8217;s not really the point. The point is that we shouldn&#8217;t even have to wonder, even for a second, if DEI played a role in an incident like this. But we do have to ask that question because any agency or organization that practices DEI cannot claim to be upholding the highest possible standards.
As Trump pointed out, that never ends well — particularly in an industry like aviation. Watch:
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If we want to avoid future disasters like this one, this is the approach we need to take. We don&#8217;t really have a choice. You simply have to establish high standards. And if you can&#8217;t find enough applicants who meet those standards — if there&#8217;s a shortage of qualified personnel — then the solution is to pay qualified applicants more, so that you attract competent people.
At this point, we also need a full accounting of the damage that the COVID lockdowns have done to this country. Last night I received an email from a senior engineer at a major company in the aviation industry: &#8220;While nobody had it easy, the aviation industry was hit particularly hard. The demand for air travel plummeted when the lockdowns took effect, resulting in massive attrition of experienced people out of every corner of the aviation industry. When demand came back about three years ago, these people were replaced by relatively young and inexperienced new hires. I would be utterly shocked if this did not in some way impact the midair collision at Reagan National.&#8221;
That&#8217;s another aspect to this incident I hadn&#8217;t really considered. We have too few qualified people in part because of the devastation that the COVID lockdowns inflicted on this country. It&#8217;s yet another reason why we should never allow lockdowns like that to occur in this country. And the current White House seems to understand that.
Moving forward, the White House has now committed to rooting out existing DEI hires at the FAA, so they can start recruiting competent employees. Speaking to Fox last night, senior White House official Stephen Miller said that&#8217;s exactly what&#8217;s about to happen. Watch:
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This is the step we need to take. We have no other choice. Once an organization actually rewards competence, things start improving very quickly. A competent FAA official might decide, for example, that it&#8217;s a bad idea to have a helicopter route pass right in front of a major airport, on the assumption that the helicopter will never make a mistake and go 100 feet above or below their assigned altitude.
Those are the kinds of practical, life-saving decisions that get made when you&#8217;re focused entirely on your mission, and nothing else. They&#8217;re the kinds of decisions that Americans just voted for, in record numbers. And they&#8217;re the kinds of decisions that need to get made, immediately, before a lot more people die.

Why The Plane Crash Was Entirely Foreseeable And Preventable

President <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/topic/donald-trump" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Donald Trump</a> mocked a reporter on Thursday for asking an absurd question about him visiting the crash scene of the passenger jet that went down in the Potomac River this week.
The exchange happened after Trump signed an executive order in the Oval Office and was answering a few questions from reporters.
&#8220;Do you have a plan to go visit the site or meet with any of the first responders?&#8221; the reporter asked.
&#8220;I have a plan to visit, not the site, because you tell me, what&#8217;s the site?&#8221; Trump responded. &#8220;The water?&#8221;
&#8220;You want me to go swimming?&#8221; Trump asked.
WATCH:
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The exchange came after Trump signed two executive orders on Thursday following the tragic plane and helicopter collision at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.
Trump’s first executive order appointed Chris Rochelau as deputy administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration. Rochelau will serve as the acting administrator since the administrator seat is currently vacant, the president’s staff secretary, Will Scharf, said at the signing.
The president’s second executive action is titled: “Immediate Assessment of Aviation Safety.” It orders the Secretary of Transportation and the FAA administrator to “review all hiring decisions and changes to safety protocols made during the prior 4 years, and to take such corrective action as necessary to achieve uncompromised aviation safety, including the replacement of any individuals who do not meet qualification standards.”
“This review shall include a systematic assessment of any deterioration in hiring standards and aviation safety standards and protocols during the Biden Administration,” the order notes.
Trump stressed to reporters on Thursday that though it is unclear what role DEI measures played in the tragic plane crash, it is extremely important to his administration that employees be chosen on merit and competency.
“We want the most competent people,” he said. “We don’t care what race they are. We want the most competent people, especially in those positions. You’re talking about extremely complex things, and if they don’t have a great brain, a great power of the brain, they’re not going to be very good at what they do, and bad things will happen.”
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President Trump Signs Executive Orders On Aviation Safety

Trump Mocks Reporter Over Nonsensical Question On Plane Crash

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