US

Helicopter Crashes Into NYC’s East River — 4 Rescued, 1 Dead

UPDATE:

NEW YORK (AP) — The body of a person who was missing after a helicopter crashed into New York City’s East River has been pulled from the murky water.

Police say the victim was a woman. She was among five people on the helicopter when it crashed Tuesday afternoon.

The pilot and three others were pulled alive from the water by rescue crews shortly after the chopper went down.

Witnesses say the chopper was “out of control” before the crash.

Original story below.

NEW YORK (The Blaze/AP) — A helicopter with five people aboard crashed into the East River on Tuesday afternoon after taking off from a launch pad on the riverbank, seriously injuring at least two people and leaving one missing (watch a live stream of the coverage here). The New York Times provides a recap of what one witness saw:

One witness, Carlos Acevedo, who was on the pier near the heliport with his girlfriend, said he believed the helicopter that crashed was trying to land, but that a second helicopter was on the helipad blocking its ability to do so.

The one in the air began rising slightly, then it began spinning around and then went straight into the water, Mr. Acevedo said.

“It spun around a few times and then went into the water,” said Mr. Acevedo, 40, who spoke in Spanish. “Then some employees form the heliport scrambled around and lowered ladders into the water. That’s when the police and firemen showed up.”

The pilot and three others were pulled alive from the water by rescue crews shortly after the chopper went down. Authorities were searching for one other passenger, believed to be female, but the Bell 206 helicopter was submerged in the murky water, police spokesman Paul Browne said.

The private chopper went into the river off 34th Street in midtown Manhattan. It’s unclear what happened.

A massive rescue effort was under way with a dozen boats and divers down into the cold, grey water.

The conditions of those who were rescued weren’t immediately available. The fire department said at least two people on board were taken to area hospitals in serious condition.

Joy Garnett and her husband were on the dock waiting to take the East River ferry to Brooklyn when they heard the blades of a helicopter and saw it start to take off from the nearby helipad. She said she saw it do “a funny curlicue.”

“I thought, `Is that some daredevil move?’” she said. “But it was obviously out of control. The body spun around at least two or three times, and then it went down.”

She said the chopper had lifted about 25 feet off the ground before it dropped into the water without much of a splash. It flipped over, and the blades were sticking up out of the river. She said people on the dock started throwing in life jackets and buoys. Two people came up out of the waves.

“It didn’t make much noise,” she said. “It was just a splash and sunk.”

The Bell 206 Jet Ranger is one of the world’s most popular helicopter models and was first flown in January 1966. They are light and highly maneuverable, making them popular with television stations and air taxi companies. A new one costs between $700,000 and $1.2 million.

On Aug. 8, 2009 a small plane collided with a helicopter over the East River, killing nine people, including five Italian tourists. A government safety panel found that an air traffic controller who was on a personal phone call had contributed to the accident.

The Federal Aviation Administration changed its rules for aircraft flying over New York City’s rivers after that collision. Pilots must call out their positions on the radio and obey a 161 mph speed limit. Before the changes, such radio calls were optional.

Earlier that year, an Airbus 320 airliner landed in the Hudson River after hitting birds and losing both engines shortly after taking off from LaGuardia Airport. The flight, U.S. Airways Flight 1549, became known as the Miracle on the Hudson plane.

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