WASHINGTON — The Federal Aviation Administration missed a deadline for responding to the air safety questions of Maryland’s U.S. senators, who have expressed lingering concerns following the midair collision of a commercial plane and an Army helicopter near Reagan National Airport in January.

“There are a number of things that need to be done,” U.S. Sen. Chris Van Hollen, the Maryland Democrat, told The Baltimore Sun Friday. “We have an air traffic control shortage nationwide, including at National Airport, that needs to be addressed immediately.”

Van Hollen and fellow Maryland Democratic Sen. Angela Alsobrooks joined with Virginia and D.C. lawmakers in posing a series of questions to acting FAA administrator Chris Rochelau on Feb. 10 following the January collision that killed 67 people. The victims included Olivia Ter, a 12-year-old Prince George’s County ice skater, and several members of a UA Steamfitters union local in Maryland.

In the crash’s aftermath, the FAA is reviewing helicopter routes near other airports that — like Reagan National — have significant volumes of helicopter and airplane traffic, Rochelau told a Senate Commerce subcommittee during a hearing Thursday. He said the reviews should be completed in a few weeks.

The FAA confirmed to The Sun on Friday that its risk assessment includes the entire Baltimore-Washington region, which, in addition to Reagan National, is home to BWI-Marshall Airport and Dulles International Airport in Virginia.

“The FAA will have corrective action plans for any risks that are identified,” the agency said in a statement on Friday.

The Maryland Aviation Administration declined The Sun’s request to comment on the interaction between helicopters and planes at or near BWI. “The FAA is responsible for controlling the national air space, including flight arrivals and departures at BWI Marshall and airports around the country,” an administration spokesman said in an emailed response.

The senators’ letter posed a number of questions, including whether the FAA would commit to quickly implementing recommendations made by the National Transportation Safety Board, which is investigating the collision.

The letter seeks details of the role being played at the agency by Trump advisor Elon Musk’s cost-cutting organization, the Department of Government Efficiency. While congressional Republicans have largely backed Musk’s efforts to downsize and reshape government, Van Hollen’s letter said “recent actions indicate that your agency is inviting inexperienced individuals with intense partisan leanings into a process that should be objective and expert driven.”

It referred to a Feb. 5 tweet by Musk on X, the social media platform he owns. “With the support of President @realDonaldTrump, the @DOGE team will aim to make rapid safety upgrades to the air traffic control system,” Musk’s post said.

“We are extremely concerned,” the lawmakers’ letter said, about “an ad hoc team of individuals lacking any expertise, exposure, certifications, or knowledge of aviation operations being invited, or inserting themselves, to make ‘rapid’ changes to our nation’s air traffic systems. This is the wrong course of action to take.”

Van Hollen said Friday that the agency was given until March 24 to respond to the letter, which was also signed by Virginia Democratic Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine and D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton.

“We set a reasonable deadline,” Van Hollen told The Sun. “And it has passed, so you can be sure we will be following up with them.”

Asked about missing the deadline, the FAA told The Sun: “We will respond to the senators directly about the letter.”

Almost nine months before the midair collision, Van Hollen and now-retired Sen. Ben Cardin warned about the safety implications of overcrowding the airspace around the airport. They joined their counterparts from Virginia as the only four holdouts in the Senate to vote against an FAA reauthorization bill.

Their concerns stemmed from a provision that added 10 new flights to Reagan National, one of the busiest airports in the country.

Investigators have highlighted 85 close calls around Reagan National in the three years before the crash that should have signaled a growing safety problem. Rocheleau told the aviation subcommittee on Thursday that every close call is investigated and all the data was reviewed before, but this alarming trend was missed.

Since the collision, the FAA has restricted non-essential helicopter traffic around Reagan National.

The agency has also fired several hundred employees. The Trump administration says no critical safety personnel were cut.

But Maryland’s senators urged the administration to speed the hiring of air traffic controllers.

“It’s clear that our air traffic control system needs federal resources to modernize. What we’ve seen in the past few months in the skies is unacceptable,” Alsobrooks said in a statement.

Recent incidents have included a medical transport plane that had just taken off before plummeting into a Philadelphia neighborhood in late January, killing all six people on board and one person on the ground; and an American Airlines plane that caught fire after landing in Denver earlier this month.

According to Van Hollen, the FAA has about 10% fewer controllers than in 2012.

Rochelau told the subcommittee that about 10,750 air traffic controllers are currently on the job, with more than 3,000 in training, and that the agency plans to hire another 2,000 trainees this year.

The Associated Press contributed to this article. Have a news tip? Contact Jeff Barker at jebarker@baltsun.com