US senators want defense bill helicopter provision dropped

A barge carrying a crane move parts of the wreckage from the Potomac River, in the aftermath of the collision of American Eagle flight 5342 and a Black Hawk helicopter that crashed into the river, by the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, in Arlington, Virginia, U.S., February 5, 2025. REUTERS/Eduardo Munoz

WASHINGTON, Dec 11 - The chair of the Senate Commerce Committee and the panel's top Democrat on Thursday pushed to revise an annual defense bill to bolster military helicopter safety after a fatal American Airlines collision with an Army Black Hawk killed 67 people in January near Reagan Washington National Airport.

Republican Senator Ted Cruz and Democrat Maria Cantwell filed an amendment to strike the military helicopter language in the defense bill and insert tougher requirements.

“We owe it to the families to put into law actual safety improvements, not give the Department of Defense bigger loopholes to exploit," the senators said in a joint statement.

(Reporting by David Shepardson in Washington)