“…We owe it to the families to improve the FAA oversight of this system,” Senator says on MSNBC Morning Joe

[VIDEO]

WASHINGTON, D.C. – This morning, U.S. Senator Maria Cantwell (D-Wash.), Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, joined MSNBC’s Morning Joe to discuss the National Transportation Safety Board’s (NTSB) investigative hearing into the January 29, 2025 mid-air collision between an Army Black Hawk helicopter and American Airlines flight 5342 near DCA that took the lives of 67 people. The 3-day hearing – which concludes today – has revealed massive failures by FAA leaders to listen to and act on safety warnings from its own front-line employees.  

“[W]hat it all points to is that the FAA needs to listen to the air traffic controllers and the data that was there and available, and they need to lead on better safety regimes,” said Sen. Cantwell. “We cannot have this kind of transportation corridor congested with both military and commercial aviation space and allowing for just a few 100 feet to be the determinant of whether people are going to be able to make that work effectively. We owe it to the families to improve the FAA oversight of this system.”

Thursday evening, Sen. Cantwell joined CNN’s The Brief With Jim Sciutto.

“We have to ask very tough questions of the FAA. How is it with those warning signs and with this information -- and even air traffic controllers suggesting that this flight path should be changed -- no one changed it?” Sen. Cantwell asked. “If the FAA didn't take the precautions in this particular…corridor, what other corridors they might also be missing?”

Video of her appearance on The Brief last night is HERE; a transcript is HERE. 

Transcript of her comments on MSNBC is below:

Jonathan Lemire: To Washington now, the National Transportation Safety Board is holding its final day of hearings into the deadly mid-air collision between a U.S. Army helicopter and a passenger plane. That crash happened back in January near Reagan National Airport. Yesterday, officials from the FAA acknowledged that the air traffic controller working that evening, should have notified the aircraft about the helicopter, but failed to do so. Let's bring in Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell of Washington state. She is the Ranking Member of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation. Senator, thank you for joining us this morning. What did you learn yesterday from this hearing? What do you hope to continue to learn today?

Sen. Cantwell: Well, we're putting more details to the information that the NTSB has gathered about the accident, and what it all points to is that the FAA needs to listen to the air traffic controllers and the data that was there and available, and they need to lead on better safety regimes. We cannot have this kind of transportation corridor congested with both military and commercial aviation space and allowing for just a few 100 feet to be the determinant of whether people are going to be able to make that work effectively. We owe it to the families to improve the FAA oversight of this system.

Lemire: And Senator indeed, looking forward, what are some changes you hope to make, particularly, as you mentioned there, the congestion in the air space around [Reagan] National Airport and the nation's capital.

Sen. Cantwell: Well, I don't know that this exemption that was given to the military to fly in this corridor was thought out, but certainly once data was provided where 1,500 [15,000] near misses happened, or even the air traffic controllers were suggesting that they did not like this route and didn't think it worked, then someone at the FAA should have taken that data and information, and made a change. And so, we need to have the aggressive responsibility with the FAA to monitor this kind of information, not just at [Reagan] National, but now at other airports where there might be a high level of interaction between corridors with military involvement and commercial air space.

On June 5^th, Commerce Committee Ranking Member Cantwell and Senators Duckworth, Klobuchar, Warnock, Kaine, Warner, and Markey introduced the Safe Operation of Shared Airspace Act of 2025 (SOSA) to strengthen aviation safety at DCA, airports across the nation, and the FAA. The bill was the first comprehensive aviation safety legislation responding to the January 29, 2025 collision between an Army Black Hawk helicopter and American Airlines flight 5342 near DCA that took the lives of 67 people. (A section by section breakdown of the bill can be found here and bill text can be found here.)

Sen. Cantwell has been a leader in the investigation of the January 29^th collision through her role on the Commerce Committee, including calling for permanent helicopter restrictions near DCA. On March 7^th, Sen. Cantwell sent a letter to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth requesting that the Department of Defense (DoD) clarify how often and why it operates aircraft in the National Capital Region without Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) Out transmitting. On June 9^th, Sen. Cantwell and Sen. Cruz called for audits of DCA airspace safety issues, sending a letter to Acting Inspector General of the Department of Transportation (DOT OIG) Mitch Behm and Inspector General of the Department of the Army (Army OIG) Lieutenant General Gregory J. Brady requesting concurrent safety audits in response to the collision, as well as ongoing coordination issues between the Army and DCA air traffic control.

Sen. Cantwell has a long history on aviation safety. Most recently, under her leadership as Chair of the Committee, the Federal Aviation Administration Reauthorization Act of 2024 passed the Senate and House with overwhelming bipartisan support and was signed into law. Boosting FAA’s safety-critical staff – including more air traffic controllers - was the top priority of the 2024 Reauthorization. In 2020, Sen. Cantwell’s landmark Aircraft Certification, Safety, and Accountability Act strengthened the FAA’s oversight of aircraft manufacturers, mandated safety management systems for aircraft manufacturers, and required the FAA to convene an independent expert panel to review the safety processes and culture of Organization Designation Authorization (ODA) holders like Boeing.

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