Search and rescue efforts have been challenging, said D.C. Fire and EMS Chief John A. Donnelly. The Potomac River is about 8 feet deep where the aircraft crashed after the collision. The water temperature was just above freezing.
The Federal Aviation Administration said the midair collision occurred over the river around 9 p.m. when a regional jet that had departed from Wichita, Kansas, collided with a military Blackhawk helicopter while on approach to an airport runway. The helicopter was on a training flight, an official told the Associated Press.
American Airlines says 60 passengers and 4 crew members were on the plane. Three soldiers were onboard the helicopter, an Army official said. Officials who held a press conference at the airport did not announce any deaths, but they all had a somber tone.
All takeoffs and landings from the airport are halted until at least 11:00 a.m. Thursday. Dive teams are scouring the site and helicopters from law enforcement agencies across the region are flying over the scene in methodical search for bodies.
Images showed boats around a partly submerged wing and what appeared to be the mangled wreckage of the plane’s fuselage.
Helicopters flew overhead with powerful search lights scanning the murky waters.
Emergency vehicles lit up the banks of the Potomac in a long line of blinking red lights.
Passengers on the American Airlines flight included a group of figure skaters, their coaches and family members who were returning from a development camp held after the national U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Wichita, U.S. Figure Skating said in a statement.
The Kremlin has confirmed that Russian figure skaters Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, who won the pairs title at the 1994 world championships and competed at the Winter Olympics twice, were aboard the plane, as well as other Russian nationals. Shishkova and Naumov are listed as professional pairs coaches on the website of the Skating Club of Boston.
Ashlyn Finch said she was at home near the Potomac River when she heard two booms.
Finch said in a Facebook message to The Associated Press that her 12-year-old son “came running down saying he saw a plane crash and the lights go into the water.”
When they opened the back door, they were hit with the smell of jet fuel, she said. Within a few minutes, they saw police officers arrive by the water, followed by helicopters and boats in the river.
(AP Photo Julio Cortez)
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