White House construction cited in Trump helicopter close call with airliner

Construction work at the White House was a factor in the US presidential helicopter passing too close to a passenger plane in the skies over Washington earlier this month, investigators said Thursday.

The close pass happened on August 4 after President Donald Trump took off on Marine One from a temporary site on the Ellipse, outside the grounds of the White House, during the construction of a permanent helipad inside the grounds.

The White House and the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have both said that Trump was never in danger.

In their preliminary report, investigators at the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) cited FAA estimates that the presidential helicopter and an Envoy Air passenger plane were separated by 1.3km (0.82 miles) horizontally and about 215 metres (700 feet) vertically when the incident happened – less than the required minimum separation of 2.4km (1.5 miles) and 152 metres (500 feet).

The NTSB is working to “calculate and confirm” those distances and is continuing its investigation.