Driving the news: The Federal Aviation Administration said a military helicopter carrying President Trump came too briefly close to a passenger jet departing Reagan Washington National Airport on Tuesday. The FAA stressed Trump was not in danger.
What happened: Marine One lifted off from the White House Tuesday afternoon. Air traffic controllers had not halted commercial flights at Reagan National as required under a policy put in place after the January 2025 midair collision that killed 67 people, according to two sources.
By the numbers: - FAA rules require at least 2.4 km (1.5 miles) of horizontal separation and 152 metres (500 feet) vertical separation around airports. - The January 2025 crash — a military helicopter and a commercial jet — killed 67 people.
The FAA's words: 'Based on our preliminary safety review, there was momentary loss of separation after which the aircraft continued to move away from one another.'
Between the lines: The incident does not implicate Trump — it implicates the controllers who cleared a commercial departure while Marine One was airborne. The post-crash protocol exists precisely to prevent this. Someone did not follow it.
The bottom line: The Reagan National corridor has been a known danger zone since the January 2025 disaster. The FAA built a rule to fix it. Tuesday's near-miss suggests the rule was ignored — and the agency owes the public a full accounting of why.