Washington plane crash that killed 67 people ‘was disaster waiting to happen’

The crash between a passenger plane and a military helicopter that killed 67 people in Washington DC was ‘a disaster waiting to happen’, experts have said.

President Donald Trump told reporters on Thursday there were no survivors when an American Airlines flight collided with a US army Black Hawk helicopter near Ronald Reagan National Airport.

While he blamed a diversity hiring spree for the deadliest US air disaster in more than 20 years, experts said they have long worried the congested and complex airspace around the nation’s capital could lead to catastrophe.

Even in peak conditions, pilots must navigate notoriously busy skies filled with hundreds of other commercial planes, military aircraft and restricted areas around sensitive sites, with the White House just five miles away.

‘This was a disaster waiting to happen,’ Ross Aimer, a retired United Airlines captain and chief executive officer of Aero Consulting Experts, said.