As I said in a previous blog, I once flew a RAF Bulldog over the top of MCO using its UHF radio. I was amazed at how quiet the frequency was despite seeing lots of traffic flying in and out.
The DCA airliner didn’t have UHF so all they knew was that the tower was talking to a helicopter and they may not have even known the Army crew stated they ‘had’ the traffic (which they obviously didn’t). So between ADS-B ‘out’ being turned off on the helicopter and not having any ability to see ‘in’ traffic, the whole situation hinged on the helicopter seeing and avoiding the airliner and that failed. Even if the active ‘out’ function was off, the passive ‘in’ function could have alerted them to the position of the airliner. If ever there was a Keystone Kops aviation episode comedy of errors, this one – sadly – was it.
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