Pregame program at Nationals Park causes evacuation of U.S. Capitol
The event involving military parachutists appears not to have been properly coordinated with authorities
By
Dayn Perry
•
1 min read
A program involving military parachutists before Wednesday night's Diamondbacks-Nationals game at Nationals Park wound up touching off brief a national-security panic. According to ESPN news services, the U.S. Capitol was briefly evacuated after a plane carrying members of the U.S. Army Golden Knights was misidentified by police as "a probable threat."
Instead, the plane was en route to Nationals Park for the planned pregame demonstration in which the Golden Knights parachuted onto the field. Nationals Park is roughly a mile from the U.S. Capitol. The aircraft, which had taken off from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, had been circling within restricted airspace and apparently had not given law enforcement advance notice of the flight:
Per @flightradar24, this U.S. Army parachute team aircraft was circling the area for a while. It’s apparently for tonight’s Nationals game.
— Andrew Desiderio (@AndrewDesiderio) April 20, 2022
It appears that someone forgot to tell USCP, triggering tonight’s evacuation order……… pic.twitter.com/2i8uvlXf4t
The U.S. Capitol Police sounded an alert, and the Capitol was evacuated around 6:30 p.m. By 8 p.m., buildings on the Capitol complex were reopened. That game itself at Nationals Park was not affected.
More from ESPN:
"House Speaker Nancy Pelosi blamed the Federal Aviation Administration in a statement Wednesday night, saying its 'apparent failure to notify Capitol Police of the pre-planned flyover Nationals Stadium is outrageous and inexcusable.' The FAA did not respond to a request for comment."
Pelosi also said that, "Congress looks forward to reviewing the results of a thorough after-action review that determines what precisely went wrong today and who at the Federal Aviation Administration will be held accountable for this outrageous and frightening mistake.''
