SAVANNAH, Ga. (WSAV) — WSAV spoke to a man that has flown the route that the Black Hawk pilots were flying Wednesday night many times.
"An accident typically is a series of many small things that line up at the same time", says retired helicopter pilot and flight instructor Don Pope.
Pope said there can be many difficulties when flying helicopters in that area. The airspace requires a special permit to fly in because of how dangerous it can be.
There are several factors that Pope said can play a part in an already difficult space to fly in, no matter how much experience you have.
"Just based on my experiences with night vision goggles, that could have played a factor in it," Pope said. "Night vision goggles tend to limit the field of view between 40 and 60 degrees, so the head really has to be on a swivel. The other thing about night vision goggles that's a challenge is it takes about 50 hours under the goggles before you have accurate depth perception, which could have a pilot in a helicopter call traffic out that is actually the aircraft because it's a loss of depth perception. That's one of the factors."
Another thing that he said was the pillars in a Black Hawk.
"The other factor you want to look at is when you look at a black hawk it has a lot of structural pillars in it," he said, "a lot of stuff that goes across the windshield, across what you call an a-pillar in a vehicle. Traffic can be hidden behind those pillars sometimes. So, you really have to have your head on a swivel and pay attention."
He said that the routes in the Potomac airspace have been very stressful.
"Then there's the question also," Pope told WSAV, "if they were at the corporate altitude. When you're flying over that area, their routes up and down the Potomac, and the obvious things are fairly low, very low. I can tell you some of the most stressful flights I've ever taken is going into that special use airspace."
Pop also made it very clear that pilots must have special permits to fly into the airspace because of how busy and dangerous it is making it known that the Black Hawk pilots on this training mission last night were the best of the best.
The full interview can be watched below.