The ROTOR Act (S. 2503), before the U.S. House this week, addresses only two of the NTSB's 50 recommendations from the January 29, 2025 midair collision at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport. Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Sam Graves (R-MO), an active pilot, opposes the bill and backs a competing measure called the ALERT Act.

What happened at DCA on January 29, 2025?

A U.S. Army helicopter and an American Airlines flight collided on final approach to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport on January 29, 2025. The crash killed all 67 passengers and crew across both aircraft.

The NTSB, joined by federal partners and law enforcement, spent the past year on what Graves called "one of the most impressive and comprehensive investigations I've seen." The Board's final report, released last week, includes findings, a probable cause, and 50 safety recommendations.

Why does Graves reject the ROTOR Act?

Graves told the House that the Rotorcraft Operations Transparency and Oversight Reform Act "provides an overly prescriptive approach to mandating a specific technology" that "is still largely under development." That approach, in his words, "can prove burdensome to some operators and create barriers to its adoption."

The technology is Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) In. An NTSB Board Member included explicit caveats in the final report about deploying it at scale:

"While we laud ADS-B systems as an emerging technology in commercial fixed-wing and rotorcraft aviation that could have prevented this accident, it is still exactly that, an emerging technology. There are still technological barriers to implementing ADS-B In into the 5,500 commercial aircraft that are in the skies at any given moment."

What is the ALERT Act alternative?

Last Friday, Graves introduced the ALERT Act alongside Transportation and Infrastructure Ranking Member Rick Larsen (D-WA), Armed Services Chairman Mike Rogers (R-AL), and Armed Services Ranking Member Adam Smith (D-WA). The bill covers all 50 NTSB recommendations.

Graves described the ALERT Act as a "comprehensive package of improvements that addresses all 50 safety recommendations." It uses "a performance-based and technology agnostic approach," letting aircraft equip with "the appropriate collision mitigation system" without locking operators into one product.

Has Congress mandated ADS-B In before?

Congress passed a similar mandate in 2012. The rule proved unworkable because the technology and its scalable applications were not mature enough to benefit a broad range of operators. Lawmakers repealed the mandate in 2018.

Graves framed the current bill as the same misstep. "My greatest fear," he said, "is that passage of this legislation today, in its current form, will unintentionally lead to an operational crisis in 2031 and force future Congresses to have the same debate on the need to repeal another unworkable government mandate."

What is Graves' aviation background?

Graves, who represents northwest Missouri, has served on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee since joining Congress in 2001. He learned to fly at Gould Peterson Municipal Airport, a strip on his family farm in Tarkio named after his uncle.

"Let me be extremely clear – as a pilot myself, I unequivocally support the adoption of safety enhancing technologies," he said on the House floor. "I want to get this right."

What's next?

The House is expected to weigh further procedural votes on S. 2503 this week. Graves pledged his chamber would pursue the ALERT Act as a separate legislative vehicle. The FAA Reauthorization Act of 2024, passed in the previous Congress, remains the most recent broad aviation safety statute on the books; collision-avoidance requirements now travel through two competing House bills.