Arland D. Williams Jr. Memorial Bridge

The Arland D. Williams, Jr. Memorial Bridge is located on the Potomac River between Arlington, Virginia and Washington, DC. Interstate Highway 395 and U.S. Highway 1 cross on the 3 spans of the bridge complex. The bridge, which is part of the 14th Street Bridge Complex, was originally named the Rochambeau Bridge when it was built in 1950. In 1983, the Rochambeau Bridge was renamed the Arland D. Williams Jr. Memorial Bridge to honor Arland D. Williams Jr.

On January 13, 1982, during an extraordinary period of freezing weather, Air Florida Flight 90 took off from nearby Washington National Airport, failed to gain altitude, and crashed into the bridge, where it hit six cars and a truck on the bridge, killing four motorists. The plane then fell into the freezing Potomac River.

Only six of the airliner's 74 occupants were able to escape the sinking plane. One of these, later identified as 50 year old Arland D. Williams Jr., repeatedly gave up a rescue line from after the heroic Flight 90 passenger who perished while saving others from the icy waters. The next day, The Washington Post described his heroism:

"He was about 50 years old, one of half a dozen survivors clinging to twisted wreckage bobbing in the icy Potomac when the first helicopter arrived. To the copter's two-man Park Police crew he seemed the most alert. Life vests were dropped, then a flotation ball. The man passed them to the others. On two occasions, the crew recalled last night, he handed away a life line from the hovering machine that could have dragged him to safety. The helicopter crew - who rescued five people, the only persons who survived from the jetliner - lifted a woman to the riverbank, then dragged three more persons across the ice to safety. Then the life line saved a woman who was trying to swim away from the sinking wreckage, and the helicopter pilot, Donald W. Usher, returned to the scene, but the man was gone,"

source: "A Hero - Passenger Aids Others, Then Dies", The Washington Post, January 14, 1982.

External links

• Air Florida Flight 90: Reservists remember
• 14th Street Bridge, the Air Florida Crash, and Subway Disaster
• Aviation safety network - accident description
• Cockpit voice recording transcript for the crash of Air Florida Flight 90