Free Country: Sam Adler-Bell - Deadly Interference Trump and Musk profit from the breakdown.

IN THE MOMENTS BEFORE an Army Black Hawk helicopter collided with a passenger jet over the Potomac River on January 29, killing 67, an air-traffic controller at Reagan National Airport repeatedly alerted the helicopter to the presence of the jet.

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The Black Hawk pilots replied that they had the plane "in sight." In the audio, there is an eerie, workaday calm to these exchanges. There is no panic; nothing seems amiss except, perhaps, the quickening pace. As the trajectories of the two aircrafts converge, the control tower instructs the helicopter to "pass behind" the jet. Seconds later, you can hear the controllers react to the collision: "Ooh! Oh my "The audio cuts out before the word God.

Since the crash, I've been haunted by this transmission: the sudden change from professional placidity to alarm, from control to helplessness. There is pathos in the panic. It's the sound of people watching a disaster unfold that seconds earlier might have been prevented. We don't know precisely why this collision happened.

Experts have speculated about several factors: failed or faulty collision-alarm systems, night-vision goggles obstructing the pilots' view, congested airspace, understaffing.

What we do know is that a highly complex system of human and mechanical coordination broke down. Once it had, there was little to do but appeal to the Almighty.

By the next day, President Donald Trump and his allies had settled on a culprit: diversity, equity, and inclusion. As investigators sought basic facts about the accident, Trump, Vice-President J. D. Vance, and Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth blamed, without evidence, Federal Aviation Administration efforts to diversify the workforce.