The Federal Aviation Administration on Friday apologized for its failure to notify Capitol Police about a parachute stunt at Nationals Park that led to an urgent evacuation of the U.S. Capitol. “The FAA’s initial review of the circumstances surrounding Wednesday night’s parachute demonstration by the U.S. Army Golden Knights at Nationals Park showed that we did not provide advance notification of this event…
Investigators were still working to determine why the event wasn't properly coordinated with law enforcement officials in Washington, the law enforcement official and another U.S. official familiar with the matter told The Associated Press. Multiple federal agencies began scrambling officials as the plane circled overhead.
The capital region is defended by several surface-to-air missile sites, as well as military aircrews on round-the-clock alert. It did not appear that any of those systems was scrambled. The plane landed back at Andrews around 6:50 p.m. after the parachutists descended into the middle of the field at Nationals Park, a little more than 1 mile from the U.S. Capitol.
One witness to the chaos at the Capitol was Eireann Dolan, the wife of Nationals pitcher Sean Doolittle. “I was walking the dogs past the Dirksen Senate Office Building," Dolan tweeted. ”People started streaming out all at once. They told me to turn around and get away as fast as possible. Some people were calm but many were genuinely panicked. I know I was." to the Arizona Diamondbacks 11-2.
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