The first fatal U.S. commercial airline accident in nearly 15 years on January 30 near Reagan National Airport has gripped the nation.

And as these tragedies usually go, they come in threes.

The terrible loss of life in the Philadelphia Jet Rescue Air Ambulance Learjet 55 crash,  and then the fire on the United Flight on the runway at the Houston’s Bush Airport, were the other two.

Fortunately all of the passengers in Houston deplaned unharmed.

Everywhere you went on Thursday after the DC crash and days afterward that’s what everyone was talking about.

They were sympathetic to the families of the 67 victims (three in the Army Black Hawk helicopter and 60 passengers and four crew members on the American Airlines commuter flight).

Personally, I’ve been on planes that have taken off and landed at Reagan numerous times over the years and never knew until this tragedy that the runway is 6,000 feet shorter than a normal runway for commercial airline flights.

Come to find out the normal commercial runway is 13,000 feet while Reagan National’s is only 7,000 feet.

As the details of the event unfold we’re learning that staffing in the Air Traffic Control Tower were “not normal,” according to the FAA.

The FAA is also reporting one air traffic controller was assigned to both the helicopter and the passenger jet.

U.S. Figure Skating released a statement confirming that “14 members of our skating community” were aboard the flight.

The organization said they were returning home from a development camp after the U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Wichita, Kansas, which concluded Sunday.

And as usual around a tragedy like this one there are stories like U.S. Figure Skater Jon Maravilla who missed the flight due to the size of his dog.

His number wasn’t up.

I had a personal similar experience when a cousin-in-law got stuck in traffic and missed a Delta Flight that crashed in Dallas Aug. 2, 1985.

It wasn’t his time, then, either to be on that plane that went down before making it to the runway due to a downburst.

Missing flights proved to be good news for those two people.

The crash January 29 night is a very sad, sad story.

Then all those lost on the Air Ambulance and those on the ground including the wounded and the damage to vehicles and buildings is terrible.

On Sunday our Pastor said be ready because you never know when it’s your time.