Suit Filed in Potomac Helicopter Crash Case

Partner Robert Spragg and Counsel Frank Fleming recently filed suit in Maryland Federal Court against helicopter manufacturer Eurocopter and others for the wrongful death of a 29-year-old flight paramedic killed when an EC135 helicopter crashed at night into the Potomac River near the Woodrow Wilson Bridge.

At the time of the crash, the bridge, which links Maryland and Virginia, was under construction and several tall cranes were in the vicinity. The suit, which will soon add the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) as a defendant, claims the cranes were not properly lit at night in an area of air traffic to and from Reagan National Airport, and that the FAA failed to warn pilots of the danger posed by the cranes.

The suit also criticizes the crashworthiness of the EC135 helicopter because two people were killed in what should have been a survivable crash.