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Authorities declined to say what may have caused the deadly plane crash in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday night while the investigation is underway, even as President Donald Trump and his allies sought to politicize the incident by blaming diversity efforts.
“We will not be determining the probable cause of the accident while we are here on scene, nor will we speculate about what may have caused this accident,” J. Todd Inman, member of the National Transportation Safety Board, said at a news conference Thursday afternoon.
Jennifer L. Homendy, the chair of the NTSB, said the probe will focus on several factors. “As part of any investigation, we look at the human, the machine and the environment,” she said. “So we will look at all the humans that were involved in this accident. Again, we will look at the aircraft. We will look at the helicopter. We will look at the environment in which they were operating in. That is standard in any part of our investigation.”
Homendy said the investigation is a “whole-of-government effort” and cautioned that it will “take time to verify” information.
The rescue operation had turned into a recovery effort by Thursday morning. Officials have said they do not believe there are any survivors in the crash. D.C. Fire and EMS Chief John A. Donnelly said early Thursday that at least 28 bodies have been recovered from the water.
The midair collision between the commercial flight from Wichita, Kansas, and an Army helicopter occurred near Reagan Washington National Airport late Wednesday night.
The American Eagle flight was carrying 60 passengers and four crew members. More than a dozen of them were figure skaters traveling back from a training camp in Wichita, along with their coaches and parents, according to Skating Club of Boston CEO Doug Zeghibe.
Two of the coaches were former Russian world champions Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov, Zeghibe said. Kremlin officials have confirmed that Russian nationals were on the flight.
The crash is the deadliest commercial aviation accident since 2009.
A preliminary report from the Federal Aviation Administration stated there was only one airport tower controller overseeing both airplane and helicopter activity during the crash, instead of one for each, NBC News reported, citing a source with knowledge of the situation. The staffing situation, although permitted under FAA guidelines, was “not normal” for the amount of air traffic and for the time of day, according to the report.
Inman said the NTSB will issue a preliminary report within 30 days. He referred questions about fatalities to the D.C. medical examiner, adding that the evidence so far indicates that no emergency slides or chutes were deployed from the plane. “It was a very quick, rapid impact,” Inman said.
The NTSB is a nonpartisan agency that investigates transportation incidents for the federal government, and it is the only one with the authority to release information about the cause of such crashes.
Although the cause of the collision is still being investigated, Trump, who launched a crackdown on diversity, inclusion and equity programs in the federal government since returning to the White House, quickly spread baseless claims that diversity efforts were to blame for the incident.