is no administrator at the faa.nce regulators are in place, secretary duffy brings in his staff, it will be a part of the dialogue going forward. caroline: we await president trump to brief us and the world at the white house press briefing room. sid, last week on this the faa lack of leadership, how important is that? sid: it is a significant position. the fact that there is no leadership at the faa is a significant vacuum. remember, the aviation industry has been through a lot in the last year or so. last january, we had a blowout of the boeing 737 max door which led to a lot of scrutiny on bowling, safety, manufacturing, the cap on production at boeing. caroline: we now see the president beginning to address at the white house. pres. trump: a moment of silence for the victims and their families, please. thank you very much. i speak to you this morning in an hour of anguish for our nation. just before 9:00 p.m. last night, and american airlines regional jet carrying 60 passengers and four crew collided with an arm

faa? to which there was no answer, which apparently prompted donald trump today at a press conference to surprise name a new head of the faa for the first time because he'd never bothered to do it before. and yes, it is the faa that is one of the agencies that will now be in charge of figuring out what went wrong in this devastating plane crash that killed dozens of americans last night. but don't worry, donald trump says he has already figured out what happened. what happened here was diversity. and he's eliminating diversity. and so we can all feel safe. all our problems are all solved because, yeah, look at all the cable news hosts. the one guy's got the little jacket, and the other guy's blurting out information on service members who have been killed. the president himself says he thinks he might get wet if he visits the crash site because it's a river. so no, he's not going to do that because it's wet. just excellence through and through, right? just look at these guys. can't you see

of the faa diversity and inclusion hiring plan which says diversity is integral to achieving faa's missionng safe and efficient travel. i don't think so but i don't think so. think it is just the opposite for the faa website shows the agency guidance under diversity hiring will march 23. they want to make it even more so. and then i came in. i assume maybe this is the reason for the faa which is overseen by secretary pete buttigieg pretty is a real winner just how badly everything is run since he run the department of transportation? he is a disaster. he was a disaster as a bear. he ran his city into the ground that he is a disaster now. he's got a good line of [bleep]. his a government agency charged with regulating civil aviation. while heng runs it, 45000 people and is run it right into the ground with his diversity. so i had to say it is terrible. a group within the faa determine the workforce was too white. they had concerted efforts to get the administration to change that. and to change that immediately. this is in the obama administration just prior to my getting there. we took car

by the faa, a c rj 700 point what we know is confirmed by the faa, a c rj 700 regional jet operatedc. beyond that we don't know much. is beyond that we don't know much, is confirmed by the faa beyond that we don't know much. is confirmed by the faa this beyond that we don't know much, i be infirmed by the faa this beyond that we don't know much, i be sadly ed by the faa this beyond that we don't know much, i be sadly the y the faa this beyond that we don't know much, i be sadly the worst faa this beyond that we don't know much. i be sadly the worst airi this will’be sadly the worst air �* to in the us disaster to happen in the us since kogan air since the kogan air crash in 2009 near buffalo.- 2009 near buffalo. what could have caused — 2009 near buffalo. what could have caused something - 2009 near buffalo. what could have caused something like i have caused something like that wanting to speculate, typically there is very strong infrastructure behind flight plans, flight paths, how would til-abs..nght paths. how would-,--- -- like ever plea-flehflight paths. how would-,--- -- like

the faa's website states. they include hearing, vision, missing extremities, partial paralysis, complete paralysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability, and dwarfism all qualify for the position of a controller of airplanes pouring into our country, pouring into a little spot, a little dot on the map, a little runway. it's part of the diversity and inclusion hiring plan. think of that, it is part of the diversity and inclusion hiring plan, which says diversity is integral to achieving the faa mission of assuring safe and efficient travel -- i don't think so. i think it is the opposite. the faa website shows the agency guidance on diversity hiring were last updated march 23 of 2022, they wanted to make it more so, then i came in. i assume this is the reason. the faa, overseen by secretary pete buttigieg, a real winner, that guy is a real winner -- do you know how badly everything was run since he's run the department of transportation? he's a disaster. he was a disaster as a mayor,

faa's push focus on hiring people severe intellectual and psychiatric his abilities. that is amazing. faa, serves people with severe disabilities, the most underrepresented segment in the workforce. they can be air traffic controllers. i don't think so. january 14, a week before i entered office, a big push to put diversity to the faa's program and then another article, before i got to office second term, the faa is active and suffers severe intellectual disabilities psychiatric problems. these are people, there lives are shortened as of the distressed they have. brilliant people. they have to be in those positions and their lives are actually shortened. a very special talent. a special emphasis treatment hiring, the faa's website, they include hearing, vision partial paralysis from a complete analysis, epilepsy, severe intellectual disability, psychiatric disability and dwarfism all qualify for the position of the comptroller of airplanes pouring into our country. a little dot on the map.

the faa and the and u.s. military will be carrying out a systematic and comprehensive investigation most of our new secretary of transportation sean duffy, his second day on the job when that happened. it is a rough one. we'll be working tirelessly. these is a great gentlemen. the whole group -- these are great people. they are working tirelessly to figure out exactly what happened. we will state certain opinions, however. i am immediately appointing and acting commissioner to the faa, a 22 year veteran of the agency, highly respected post of christopher, thank you very much. appreciate it. only the highest standards for those who work in our aviation system. change the obama standards from mediocre at best to extraordinary. you remember that. only the highest aptitude. have to be the highest intellect and psychologically superior people were allowed to qualify for air traffic controllers. that was not so prior to getting there when i arrived in 2016. i made that change very early on because i always felt thi

>> i can say again, we work with the faa, regulated by the faa, we comply with all faa safety regulations. >> that does not answer the question -- >> can you talk about how much debris has been moved to hangar seven? and at some point, can that be transitioned to a private company -- >> that is an investigation question appropriate for ntsb this afternoon. >> we will take two more. >> i have a question for terri, as well. as far as the airport took a position against adding extra long distance flights out of here. one of the concerns was there is too much going on. are you concerned about safety -- >> thanks. the question was regarding the additional slots to dca. as you know, the slots are federally controlled, federally mandated. >> again, we have to follow the federal regulations on the slot control. >> one more question for you. talking about the faa, congress, federally mandated. where does the buck stop with this accident in ensuring the next flight to take off from the runway is safe? >> the question is really directed to the faa and congress, i believe. >> last questions right her

the faa is no different. obviously, they've already admitted to not having enough staff, and that's probably because they haven't hired the qualified that staff. and so we have to go right directly at this. i know people say it's a sensitive topic, but we have to fix these issues in our nation. we have too much identity politics. we have too much focus on skin color, on gender and on race in these major agencies. and president trump has made a hard push and put a line in the sand has been drawn, and i think it's time for us to have some real answers from these agencies. elizabeth: you know, jack, here's some answers. sena records, we did a deep dive, government documents back up that trump is right that the faa under barack obama dangerously and dramatically dumbed down its hiring standards 202013. starting way back in and that ended up screening out and rejecting nearly 26,000 qualified commercial pilots and to be traffic controllers justns in 2014 alone. senator patty murray warningcrat obama's faa chief ab

a group within the faa.nother story determined that the workforce was too white, that they had concerted efforts to get the administration to change that and to change it immediately. this was in the obama administration, but they actually came out with a directive to white. and we want the people that are competent. >> so when he was pressed at that press conference about what are you basing this on, where's your evidence? he said it was common sense. is that common sense backed up by any facts? >> it is not. i think we have to say first and foremost that there is zero evidence whatsoever that anything to do with the faa's efforts to hire people of diverse backgrounds, people with disabilities had anything to do with this tragedy. so i think this is one of these fact checks where it's like, wait, why are we even talking about this? but we're talking about it because the president started a national conversation about faa hiring practices. so i think it's important for people to know a couple of things. firs

so for the last week, we have been leaderless at the faa. we have had no one in charge of the faa.rump fired upon taking office, the entire faa safety advisory board. he spent the last week trying to push federal employees out the door, including people at the faa, trying to bully them into accepting offers to resign. and so we got reports that the control tower was not normal on the night of the crash. well, that stands to reason, because the faa has been in meltdown since trump took over. he knows that he would have to answer for that. so instead of actually explaining why he left the faa leaderless and without any direction in chaos, he's blaming black people and blaming women who work at the faa without any evidence. of course, he has no evidence that that's true because it's not true. and you know, who knows? let's see what's what. the real reason is here. but this could be a cover up. >> it could be a cover up. listen, have you seen any evidence that the staffing issue inside that control tower was tied to the shift in administration? we are told that it wasn't staffed the wa

the faa the u.s. military will have a systematic investigation sean duffy, second day on the job when that happened. a rate gentleman, these are great people and they are working tirelessly to pick out happened. i am immediately appointing acting commissioner to the faa, a 22 year veteran. thank you very much. appreciate it. the highest standards for those in the system. i change the obama standards mediocre at best, to extraordinary. remember that the highest aptitude all the highest intellect psychologically superior people were allowed to qualify. that was not so prior to getting there when i arrived in 2016. i made that change very early on because i always felt it was a job -- others jobs, to but this was a job that had to be superior intelligence we didn't really have that. when left office and biden took over, he changed it back to lower than ever before. i put safety first, obama, biden and safety, they put policy. they put politics at a level nobody's ever seen. this is the lowest level. the

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>> i can say again we work with the faa and regulated by the faa and comply with all faa on the sceneu talk about how much debris has been removed? at some point, do you have an operation transition and will hire locally? >> that is an investigation question and appropriate for ntsb this afternoon. >> thank you, mark. >> yes. yes, sir. >> that question, as far as the airport took the position against adding. [inaudible] in one of the concerns was -- [inaudible] >> thanks, tom. the question regarding slots to federally controlled and federally mandated and we have to follow regulations. >> reporter: [inaudible] >> yes, again, we have to follow the federal regulations. >> one more question for you. the faa, congress, federally mandated, et cetera, where does the buck stops with this accident and shrink the next flight take off on the runway safe? >> i can, the question is really directed to the faa and congress, i believe. last question is right here appeared. >> you have 41 victims recovered but are you company and the location of the others? where are they? are you confident you know

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ntsb has reviewed this. >> faa internal. report that has been cited by. >> the new york times. >> indicating that the controller that was on duty at the time of the crash was doing a job that's usually done by two people. >> we have not reviewed any specific reports about the controllers at this time, at least from the leadership team. our investigators are continuing to pull all that information. their personnel records, their files, where they were at, whether they were fatigued. all that information will be part of that investigative process. but right now, we can't speculate on anything that may have been reported in the media until we get the opportunity to validate and understand how it impacts the investigation, we're going to take just a few more questions. sir. >> yes. >> lauren cohan. >> uyghur magazine. what's the process and logistics like of bringing the families in? >> are they. >> coming into the airport. >> and how. >> are you going to. >> sort of the sensitivity of the. sensitivity of bringing to the place w

that is an faa responsibility. the airspace is controlled by the faa. the airport does not have any responsibility outside of the surfaces of the airport itself. >> but most certainly this has been conversations that you've had. and when it comes to safety for the airport, for the passengers that come in and out of dc, absolutely. >> the faa does regulate the airport and we follow all faa safety regulations. um, again, all i can say is the faa is responsible for the airspace. >> very briefly, a question for the chief. sir, how long do you expect it to take for the salvage to be removed from the river to recover the bodies and do everything that's necessary to bring closure for these families. >> so we're working as fast as we can. i'm not going to be able to give a timeline on that, as there's a lot of unknowns. um, but we are we hope that we have better. we have not better, but we have more salvage equipment here tomorrow. and that that operation can begin. then. so next, three questions. one, two, three. >> yeah. chief perry russell vought, abc news.

the faa and the ntsb and u.s. military will be carrying out a systematic and comprehensive investigation. our new secretary of transportation, sean duffy, his second day on the job when that happened. that's a rough one. we'll be working tirelessly. he's a great gentleman. whole group of great people, and they are working tirelessly to figure out exactly what happened. we will state certain opinions however. i'm also immediately appointing an acting commission tore faa, christopher, a 22 year veteran of the agency. highly receiver malik taylored. christopher, thank you very -- highly respected. christopher, thank you very much. the highest standards of those working in the aviation system. i changed the obama standards from mediocre to extraordinary and you remember that and only the highest aptitude have to be highest intellect and psychologically superior people were allowed to qualify for air traffic controllers. that was not so prior to getting there when i arrived in 2016. i made that change very early on bec

it will work with the faa. it will also work with the army's investigative arm that looks into these sorts of incidents, incidents, and they will work together to try to figure out exactly what happened here. and perhaps more importantly, jose, try to make sure it doesn't happen again. >> yeah. and i want to bring in yamiche alcindor at the white house. yamiche, what have we heard from the white house so far? >> well, we know. >> any moment now. >> that president trump is going to come out to the briefing room and talk to reporters. this will be the first time he's in the briefing room. and it really is, in some ways, marking the first tragedy and crisis of his short presidency, his second term here. but the president has put out a number of statements. i want to read a couple of them to you. the first was the official white house statement, which said in part, i have been fully briefed on the terrible accident which took place at reagan national airport. may god bless their souls. thank you for the incredible

and now we see that the faa is taking swift. and this is pretty major action here, where they are essentially closing these helicopter routes near reagan national airport. this coming from cnn's pete muntean. again, the breaking news is that they have indefinitely shut down the low altitude helicopter corridor that was in use at the time of wednesday night's fatal mid-air collision. that is what an faa spokesperson tells us. a little bit more detail on these routes. it says that it has closed the route north of wilson bridge that connects d.c. and virginia. and the faa has also closed another helicopter route south of the key bridge that connects georgetown neighborhood to d.c. and rosslyn. just in layman's terms, you know, this airspace, we talked about it so much and just how complicated and busy it is, simply because not only military aircraft, but also police aircraft, also traverse this airspace. and in light of this midair collision, the faa taking this stance and we heard from the ntsb yesterday where they said that durin

at the faa to hire workers with severe intellectual disabilities and psychiatric problem's at the faa people he lost their loved ones and that's across the country right now and it's a hundred percent correct there and there's a pilot shortage but it just takes just as much training to get an air traffic controller operating and no air traffic controller no matter how good they are can handle the d.c. traffic by themselves. that's why the communication issue sticks out to me and were playing with fire and that airspace for quite some time. the people of them wanting to warn about this but most have been forced to be silent. >> sean: i also friends of mine who were pilots and they've told me for the longest times that flying into jersey and new york airports have been difficult and the president described it today they fly around in circles because they are not ready to receive those planes because they are not prepared. it has been going on for some time has in it. so we want to prevent it from ever happening again. >> when you talk about go arounds and mist approaches that occurred o

a group within the faa. another story determined that the workforce was too white, that they had concerted efforts to get the administration to change that and to change it immediately. this was in the obama administration, but they actually came out with a directive to white. and we want the people that are competent. >> so keeping them honest. the faa's language about diversity was present during the first trump administration as well. it basically was an effort to follow federal law and not discriminate against people with disabilities, particularly, by the way, veterans with injuries or disabilities that they've suffered in combat. in fact, increasing federal hiring of qualified people who happen to have disabilities, that's been a goal of government agencies since the 1970s. here's a version of the faa web page on diversity. it was captured by the internet archive in december 2020, his last full month as president. and it talks about diversity and inclusion and how it's, quote, integral to achieving faa

the faa and the ntsb and u.s. military will be carrying out a systematic and comprehensive investigation. our new secretary of transportation sean duffy, his second day on the job when that happened. it is a rough one. we'll be working tirelessly. the whole group, these are great people and they are working tirelessly to figure out exactly what happened. we will state certain opinions, however. i'm also immediately appointing an acting commissioner to the faa, christopher, a 22 year veteran of the agency highly respected. christopher, thank you very much. appreciate it. must have only the highest standards for those who work in our aviation system. i changed the obama standards from very mediocre at best to extraordinary. you remember that. only the highest aptitude, they have to be highest intellect and psychologically superior people were allowed to qualify for air traffic controllers. that was not so prior to getting there when i arrived in 2016. i made that change very early on because i always felt this was a

>> yeah, i. >> can say again. >> we work with the faa. >> we're regulated. >> by the faa. >> we complyith all faa. >> safety regulations. >> but that doesn't. >> thanks. >> yes, sir. >> dave. >> can you. >> talk about how much debris has. >> been removed in. >> hangar seven? >> and at some point, that operation. >> will be transitioned to a private company? the ntsb will. >> will you. >> hire. >> a local? >> you guys actually. >> so that's an investigation question and appropriate for ntsb this afternoon. >> i'll take two more. >> yes, sir. >> tom, resume channel seven. had a question for terry as well. as far as. >> the airport took. >> a. >> position against adding extra long distance. >> flights out of here. >> and one of the concerns was. >> there's just. >> too much already going on. do you maintain those concerns because they're supposed to start in the next few months? are you concerned about safety as those extra flights start? >> yeah. >> thanks, tom. >> so the question was. >> regarding the additional slots to dca. as you know, the slots are federally controlled. >> federally

we just had one from the faa. nobody knows anything about standards being lowered that would affect air traffic controllers. any any insight into that? >> no more insight into it. we pressed the white house press secretary on this again. what is the what is the evidence, if any, that the president has to make these claims that hiring and directives have anything to do with this, and there is simply no evidence, just simply restating the president's position to eliminate die throughout the workforce. talking about competence over quotas. but no, there is zero evidence. the white house has again has given. we saw the president send a message out early this morning talking specifically about the height of the black hawk that it was flying. we asked him what evidence there was that he has on that. if he's been briefed, and the press secretary just told us he is speaking the truth, so we will see if there was any correlation. but as of now, at least they've offered zero evidence to back up his claims. >> all right. jef

they referred us to the faa. the faa said basically, it's working towards some sort of mitigation so that this stoppage doesn't happen. but could it happen? you betcha. tom vacar ktvu, fox two news. >> it's an incredible miracle that he's alive. and we're also managing a mystery because we have no idea why someone would shoot him. >> shot six times and living to tell the tale. coming up on ktvu news at five, we sit down with the business partner of the san francisco dispensary owner, who is now recovering in the hospital, as we also learn more about the suspect shot dead by police. also ahead rescued in the mountains. how crews were able to track down a lost snowboarder amid frigid temperatures. >> and a bay area weather. a cloudy, cool day out there today, though the last dry day because rainfall makes a comeback big time on your friday recast and it will (vo) fargo is your virtual assistant from wells fargo. (woman) oh, come on! come on! (vo) fargo lets you do this: (woman) fargo, turn off my debit card! (woman

the faa must prioritize public safety over cost cutting measures. meantime, congressman kevin mullin said in a statement his office is helping to ensure the situation is resolved, adding that he is pleased to learn that contract negotiations have moved in a positive direction. and tonight, the new company handling air traffic has also promised to bring in controllers if a deal can't get done by this weekend. in san carlos, christie smith, nbc, bay area news. we'll have much more coverage of the tragic crash throughout the newscast coming up at 530. we'll shine a light on some of the victims, a number of them highly accomplished figure skaters, how a bay area olympian is remembering them tonight. turning renters into homeowners. that's the goal of a new housing project in the south bay. vta unveiled a project that will build townhomes near the light rail station in san jose. that's near the corner of nevarez avenue and branham lane. vta plans on building 45 townhomes, and 15 of those will be sold to low income families. these aren't just homes. these

there are 50,000 faa employees. does this tragedy give you reason to reconsider that option of resignations because of concerns about staffing issues ? trump: if people are not coming to work, if they're not going to come into the office and report as per the date that you know what it is, everybody knows what the date is. it's been very well documented. then they're going to be terminated. >> you're not concerned though that if many people take that offer, there could be shortages that could lead to -- trump: then they will be replaced with very competent people. we have a lot of competent people in this country. >> have you spoken to any of the families of the victims of the plane crash? trump i don't want to comment on : that. >> do you have a plan to visit the site? trump: i do not have a plan to visit, because, tell me what is the site, the water? >> to meet with the first responders down there. trump: i do not plan to do that. but i will be meeting with some people that were very badly hurt with their family m

. >> the faa's diversity and inclusion hiring plan which says diversity is integral to achieving faa's mission of insuring safe and efficient travel, i don't think so. i think it's just the opposite. >> reporter: but sagan says that's unlikely. to become an air traffic controller, you must pass a medical exam and go through extensive training at the faa academy in oklahoma city. then there's another two to four years of on the job training. >> the controllers are really going to be upset over these comments because it's very demeaning. it's not like just come in from academy and get in position and they're all checked out. so if they're not competent, they're going to be weeded out. >> reporter: air traffic control staffing levels at the tower in d.c. will be one focus of the investigation. here in the bay area fing levels are near the faa's projected goals at all three major airports. the most recent staffing numbers from 123atc says as of november of 2024, sfo has 25 active controllers with nine in training, san jose with 14 active and five in training, up slightly from the faa's off

he appointed chris rocheleau, a us air force veteran, who has worked at the faa for 20 years.tepped down early from his five—year term on inauguration day to allow president trump to appoint his preferred appointee for the role. a democrat from maryland. talk to us a little bit about what you've been told and, you know, our hearts go out to the loved ones. so first and foremost, we are working to provide that assistance that people need. fact finding investigation. it needs to be transparent. it needs to be done in a way that people have confidence in the outcome. i do have confidence in the ntsb. bridge in baltimore. we don't see these kind of tragedies happen again. this was avoidable. getting the facts as to what went wrong is essential. when there was a vote on the the reauthorisation bill concerns about just the pressure that this airport was already under and efforts to make it even busier than it is. do you think is this is a reagan airportjust beyond capacity at this time? it is definitely beyond capacity. there's too much congestion. from virginia and myself opposed o

we're in acting faa director. >> all right. you've been watching a news conference from officials in washington, dc from reagan national airport for the very latest on the crash of american airlines flight 5342. in the headline, the major headline very much no survivors. they do not believe anyone survived from this accident, which means that 64 people on the american airlines flight and three on the helicopter have perished. officials tell us they've recovered 27 bodies from the plane so far, and one from the helicopter. they've located the aircraft in the river. the fuselage from the american airlines flight is inverted in three different sections in waist deep water. that's the most concrete information they provided. beyond that, still huge questions, i have to say. and for that, let's bring in cnn aviation analyst peter goelz, former ntsb managing director, because, peter, what we heard was that the american airlines flight was in a standard flight pattern. what we heard is that the training helicopter, the black hawk, was

also the acting administrator of the faa. discussion on what we know so far and our process and that was about it. >> the president stated what may have caused the crash. common sense, does that affect your progress this early in the stage? >> the ntsb, we conduct important safety mission where we take a very careful approach . i'm sorry, the question was on speculating during investigations which is, we often hear about. what i will say is we look at facts on the investigation and that will take time and at some point we will provide that factual information and provide that hopefully tomorrow. >> have you been able to retrieve the black boxes from the helicopter, did the military decide whether they will read those and what about the atc tapes? >> the question was about black boxes which are referred to as black boxes but are typically orange. we have not recovered any of the black boxes involved. we feel comfortable and confident that we will be able to, right now recovery of life is most important for those involved. ther

the faa is diversity. push includes focus on hiring people with severe intellectual and psychiatric disabilities. that is amazing. and theirs is faa says people with severe disabilities, the most. underrepresented segment of the workforce and they want to mend and they want them. they can be air traffic controllers. i don't think so. this was a january 14. so that was. week before i entered office. they put a big push to put diversity into the faa is program. and then another. article, the federal aviation administration. this was before right. we've got to office recently. second term. the faa is actively recruiting workers who suffer severe intellectual disabilities, psychiatric problems and other mental and physical conditions under a diversity and inclusion hiring initiative spelled out. the agency's website. can you imagine these are people? that are i've been actually their lives are short and because of the stress that they have. brilliant people. have to be in those positions and their lives are ac

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one controller was handling both the planes and helicopters, which is allowed under faa standards. but it's not the ideal scenario. several members of congress expressing concerns about this complex airspace there at reagan national, in and out of the airport. it's one of the busiest in the country. ntsb officials assuring the public that they will leave no stone, no stone unturned during this investigation. we will take the time that's necessary. but i'd also like to reiterate, if we find something that is a significant issue that warrants immediate action, we will not hesitate to make those recommendations and make them public. the ntsb says they plan to produce a preliminary report about this crash within 30 days. we are, of course, gathering new information this evening about the victims of this crash. 14 of them have been identified as members of the ice skating community on their way back from the u.s. championships, the u.s. nationals, which were in wichita, kansas. some of the bay area skaters were among those at the championships in wichita and knew some of the victims, li

the faa and the ntsb and the u.s.e great people, and they are working tirelessly to figure out exactly what happened. we will state certain opinions however. i'm also immediately appointing an acting commissioner to the faa, a 22-year veteran of the agency, highly respected. christopher, thank you very much. appreciate it. i set high standards f those who work in our aviation system. i changed the obama standards from very mediocre at best to extraordinary. you remember that. only the highest aptitude have to be the highest intellect and psychologically superior people were allowed to qualify for air traffic controllers. that was not so prior to getting there when i arrived in 2016. i made that change very early on because i always felt this was a job that -- and other jobs too, but this was a job that had to be superior intelligence, and we didn't really have that, and we had it, and then when i left office, and biden took over, he changed them back to lower than ever before. i put safety first. obama, biden and the

though, that is acceptable under established faa standards. investigators best includes into what went wrong may rely on the last words as they asked the chopper crew if they could see the crj, the regional jet. [ radio transmission ] the response is garbled. does the chopper pilot say aircraft in sight? if so, why did they collide? miracle on the hudson captain sulley sullenberger says that radio response is critical. >> they changed the rules. and it required that they see each other until they were safely clear. >> reporter: like many airports, reagan has had its share of close calls in recent years. march 7, 2023, controllers ordered a united flight to abort takeoff after another plane crossed in front of it. april 18, 2024, a southwest plane crossed a runway just as a jetblue flight was preparing to take off. may 30th, 2024, a controller canceled takeoff after another airliner was cleared to land on an intersecting runway. veteran pilots say flying up the river to runway 33 involves staying between four and 500 feet while helicopters shou

today we saw president trump put in place a new acting administrator of the faa as this investigation gets underway and, bret, we are told a preliminary report on what happened is still at least a month away. bret? >> bret: mark meredith outside the crash site. mark, thanks. president trump is calling the deadly air disaster an hour of anguish for our country. the president and members of his cabinet briefed white house reporters today but it quickly turned confrontational after the president placed blame, pointing the finger at policies of his predecessor's. senior white house correspondent jacqui heinrich has that story live from the north lawn. good evening, jacqui. >> good evening, bret. president trump said tonight he believes this crash was preventable. but did he not call to restrict the number of flights out of dca given the frequent military activity in that area. he said problems can be prevented with the right people. he started by appointing a new acting faa administrator. >> jacqui: what began as a somber update. >> i would like to request a moment of silence for the vict

what my concern is we have a brand new faa administrator. we have a brand new department of transportation secretary. so those are the two people who will have to support the faa and say, yes, we will stand behind you and we will make sure that you are empowered to make those decisions, such as restricting these airplanes from coming in and out. um, chad had mentioned, you know, maybe it will take a while to get it back to normal. i hope it doesn't. i hope it never gets back to normal. in fact, this airport should have been closed when dulles was built in 1964. >> yeah. and look, the fact is, those of us who live in washington, d.c., we love how close dca is, because you can be there in 15 minutes and you can fly out if you are trying to get somewhere you frequently want to go to dca. it makes your commute. you get home to your kids a lot faster. you get home to your dog a lot faster. but chad, what we saw in this press conference too was this tension about how many flights there are because and you even had a question teed up for the airpor

he said, we follow the faa rules and requirements. the faa dictates how many flights are allowed. congress orders the faa to order to add more flights. and again, the answer was we followed the faa rules and requirements. we expect an ntsb news conference shortly. they will focus largely. we expect to provide a little more a few more details, not only on the black boxes recovered yesterday from the jet, but as well the regional jet, but also we're hoping to get an update on whether they had any success in recovering the black box from the helicopter. that's critical because all of our reporting so far, all of our investigative sources have told us that, in fact, the chopper was flying too high out of its way above rather its limit of 200ft well above that limit. and then that puts it into the track, if you will, of commercial aviation activity in and around this airport, given the volume of chopper activity, given the plane activity that obviously creates potential conflicts, as we had wednesday night. and so we'll see whether the faa closing that helicopter zone will get. we'll s

. >> 50,000 faa employees. >> does this. tragedy give. >> you reason to reconsider that option of resignations because of concerns about staffing issues? >> if people. >> safety, if people aren't coming to work, if they're not going to come into the office and report as per the date, that you know what it is, everybody knows what the date is. it's been very well documented. then they're going to be terminated. >> you're not going to be. you're not concerned, though, that if many people take that offer, there could be shortages. >> that. >> could lead. >> to they'll be replaced with very competent people. we have a lot of competent people in this country. >> have you spoken to any of the families of the victims of the plane crash? >> i don't want to comment on that. >> do you have a plan to go visit the site? >> i have, i have a plan to visit, not the site, because what you tell me, what's the site? the water to meet with the first. >> responders down there. >> i don't have a plan to do that, but i will be meeting with some p