{"id":210190,"date":"2026-03-18T18:47:13","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T18:47:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/210190\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T18:47:13","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T18:47:13","slug":"american-airlines-jet-helicopter-had-a-close-call-near-san-antonio-in-february","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/210190\/","title":{"rendered":"American Airlines jet, helicopter had a close call near San Antonio in February"},"content":{"rendered":"

An American Airlines<\/a> plane had a close call with a police helicopter last month on approach to land at San Antonio International Airport, the Federal Aviation Administration said Wednesday<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The near miss occurred on Feb. 27, when Flight 1657 was cleared to land at the airport. The helicopter was flying through the airport\u2019s final approach path, according to the FAA, which oversees national airspace safety. <\/p>\n

American Airlines<\/a> is headquartered in Fort Worth, and is the dominant carrier at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe helicopter and aircraft were on converging courses when the helicopter made a left-hand turn to avoid the American Airlines flight,\u201d the FAA said in a statement. There were no injuries or deaths reported from the incident.<\/p>\n

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When reached by The Dallas Morning News, the agency declined to provide additional information beyond the news release. American Airlines did not immediately respond to a request for comment. <\/p>\n

The FAA also said that earlier this month a Beechcraft 99 aircraft and a helicopter \u201cwere on converging courses when the helicopter made a right-hand turn to avoid the Beechcraft\u201d near Hollywood Burbank International Airport in Southern California.<\/p>\n

Following the two incidents, the FAA said on Wednesday it was suspending<\/a> the use of visual separation between helicopters and aircraft, requiring air traffic controllers to use radar to keep the two separated \u201cat specific lateral or vertical distances.\u201d<\/p>\n

The incident comes more than a year after a deadly crash that occurred on Jan. 27, 2025 in Washington, D.C., when American Eagle Flight 5342 collided with an Army Black Hawk helicopter<\/a> that had flown into its path while on approach to Ronald Reagan National Airport. All 64 people on board the aircraft and three in the helicopter perished. <\/p>\n

Federal airline policy in wake of that crash remains in limbo, after the U.S. House of Representatives failed to pass legislation that would have required aircraft operators to equip fleets with a new safety system by the end of 2031, Reuters reported<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe tragedy over the Potomac one year ago revealed a startling truth: years of warning signs were missed, and the FAA needed dire reform,\u201d Sean Duffy, the U.S. Transportation Secretary, said in a statement. <\/p>\n

\u201cSince then, we\u2019ve implemented numerous changes to protect the skies over our capital and keep the traveling public safe,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the job isn\u2019t done. Using innovative data analysis, the safety team at the FAA has identified the need for enhanced protocols at all airports across the National Airspace System.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An American Airlines plane had a close call with a police helicopter last month on approach to land…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":210191,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[31,737,5721,82,84,83,16493],"class_list":["post-210190","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-airlines","tag-american-airlines","tag-dfw-airport","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-texas-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210190","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210190"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210190\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/210191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210190"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210190"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210190"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}