WASHINGTON, Aug 5 (Reuters) – A military helicopter carrying President Donald Trump came unexpectedly close to a departing passenger jet at Reagan Washington National Airport on Tuesday, the Federal Aviation Administration reported. The president was not in any danger during the incident.
This event has sparked serious concerns about why the passenger jet was permitted to take off while Marine One was in close proximity, a situation when commercial flights are generally paused.
In response to a fatal crash in January 2025 involving a military helicopter and a commercial jet that resulted in 67 deaths, the FAA had prohibited mixed helicopter and jet operations around the airport.
“Preliminary safety assessments indicate a brief loss of separation, after which the aircraft moved apart,” the FAA stated on Wednesday.
Marine One took off from the White House on Tuesday afternoon, but commercial flights at Reagan National were not suspended as mandated by a policy instituted after the previous collision, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
FAA regulations stipulate that aircraft must maintain a separation of at least 1.5 miles (2.4 km) horizontally and 500 feet (152 m) vertically in airport vicinities.
The National Transportation Safety Board announced it would investigate the occurrence.
“During the separation loss, the air traffic controller was in contact with both the commercial and Marine One pilots,” the FAA noted.
Marine One departed from the Ellipse near the White House at approximately 2:33 p.m. EDT (1833 GMT), heading to Joint Base Andrews for a journey to Los Angeles, according to a pool report.
A source indicated that Envoy Air 3742, an Embraer E170 regional jet en route to Pensacola, Florida, took off at 2:34 p.m. and was involved in the incident with Marine One. Envoy, an American Airlines subsidiary, did not immediately comment.
Both the helicopter and the jet landed safely without any issues.
The sources mentioned that the FAA plans to assemble a safety review team to investigate the incident further.
Another regional flight, Republic 4700, was three miles from Reagan during the incident and was redirected as a precaution, the first source added.
The Republic E175, operating on behalf of American Airlines, had taken off from Raleigh-Durham and maneuvered around the airport before landing at 2:52 p.m., according to FlightAware data.
Following the January 2025 midair collision between an American Airlines regional jet and an Army helicopter, the FAA implemented permanent restrictions on helicopter operations near Washington’s Reagan Airport.
Besides traffic restrictions, the FAA also prohibited the use of visual separation for managing helicopter traffic near major airports starting in March.
Typically, FAA air traffic control receives at least three minutes’ notice before Marine One’s departure to suspend traffic from Reagan Airport.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Mark Porter, David Gaffen and Jamie Freed)
