'Hotline' between Reagan National, Pentagon air traffic was down since 2022: FAA official

Contributing sentiments towards policy:

50% : FAA Deputy Chief Frank McIntosh confirmed the issue while responding to Sen. Ted Cruz during a Senate hearing on Tuesday on aviation safety and during a discussion on the deadly Jan. 29 mid-air collision between an American Eagle jet and an Army Black Hawk Helicopter. Controllers can still communicate via a landline, but the FAA official said they are pushing for the special hotline, managed by the Department of Defense, to be repaired before Army helicopter flight traffic can resume near D.C. Army Helicopter flights are not allowed near DCA unless air traffic control approval is obtained, McIntosh said.

*Our bias meter rating uses data science including sentiment analysis, machine learning and our proprietary algorithm for determining biases in news articles. Bias scores are on a scale of -100% to 100% with higher negative scores being more liberal and higher positive scores being more conservative, and 0% being neutral. The rating is an independent analysis and is not affiliated nor sponsored by the news source or any other organization.