Near-collision investigation reveals Reagan National Airport controllers failed to stop flights during military flyover

A federal investigation is focusing on an air traffic control communications breakdown that led to a formation of military jets coming within seconds of colliding with a Delta Air Lines flight near Reagan National Airport, multiple sources told CNN.

A federal investigation is focusing on an air traffic control communications breakdown that led to a formation of military jets coming within seconds of colliding with a Delta Air Lines flight near Reagan National Airport, multiple sources told CNN. The March 28 incident was in the same crowded Washington, DC, airspace that was the site of January’s fatal midair collision between a commercial flight and an Army helicopter. The new details, first reported by CNN, renew concerns about the safety of military and commercial aircraft operating in close proximity and raise new questions about whether air traffic controllers in the nation’s capital are too stressed in the wake of the worst US air disaster in decades. As previously reported by CNN, the night before the incident, a fight broke out in the Reagan National control tower, leading airport police to arrest an air traffic controller. According to previously unreleased air traffic control audio reviewed by CNN, collision alerts flashed in front of the air traffic controller responsible for handling the military jets as they maneuvered for a flyover of Arlington National Cemetery, with the controller frantically issuing instructions to the formation of four jets. “Drago 61, I need you to make a left turn, left turn heading 250 immediately,” the controller from Potomac Terminal Radar Approach Control shouted via radio to the leader of the United States Air Force T-38 jets. “Traffic opposite direction departing Washington National.”