Washington plane crash: cockpit voice recorder and flight data recorder recovered

Recorders from plane are currently at National Transportation Safety Board labs for analysis, agency says

Search and rescue efforts are seen around a wreckage site in the Potomac River from Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, early Thursday morning, Jan. 30, 2025, in Arlington, Va. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)

Investigators recovered the cockpit voice recorder and the flight data recorder from the plane involved in Wednesday night’s mid-air collision with a US military helicopter that killed all 67 people onboard both aircraft.

The recorders are currently at the National Transportation Safety Board labs for analysis, the agency said on Thursday evening, and are expected to shed light on exactly what went wrong. Preliminary reports raised questions over whether understaffing in an air traffic control tower at the Washington DC airport played a role in the United States’ worst aviation disaster in years.