WA - Copter Crash Kills Man, Two Others Hurt

greenspun.com : LUSENET : Grassroots Information Coordination Center (GICC) : One Thread

[Fair use for education and research purpose only]

Title: Copter crash kills man

Two others hurt as aircraft goes down in field near Stanwood

April 3, 2000

By SHARON SALYER and KARL SCHWEIZER Herald Writers

One man died and two others were injured when a helicopter believed to be on a sightseeing trip crashed in a field and burst into flames Sunday near Stanwood.

"It was just a ball of fire when I saw it," said Craig McCarty, who owns the field where the Bell helicopter crashed.

McCarty, who identified himself as a Seattle firefighter, said he performed CPR on one of the passengers who died at the scene.

The dead man was identified by the Snohomish County medical examiner as Michael R. Jacobs, 50, of Marysville. An autopsy will be performed today.

McCarty said he was having breakfast when the crash occurred near the 5600 block of Norman Road between Silvana and Stanwood.

"My stepson came through the doorway and asked me what was burning in the field," he said.

"We could see smoke billowing up into the sky," said Blain Egbert, McCarty's stepson.

A second passenger, Judy Jacobs, 50, wife of the man who died, was airlifted to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle where she was admitted for observation and in satisfactory condition, according to a nursing supervisor.

The pilot, identified as Steven Gable, 54, of Snohomish, was taken to Providence Everett Medical Center's Colby Campus where he was treated for cuts and released.

He declined comment on the accident.

The helicopter left Frontier Airpark, a private airfield near Arlington Airport, at 11:05 a.m. The accident was reported about 45 minutes later, said Mike O'Conner, regional duty officer for the Federal Aviation Administration.

The cause of the crash wasn't immediately known, O'Conner said. An FAA crash investigator was sent to the site Sunday afternoon to try to determine why the helicopter crashed.

"My understanding was that it was a pleasure flight and ... it burned after crashing," O'Conner said.

The pilot did not file a flight plan and was flying under visual flight rules "where there's no requirement to talk to anybody," O'Conner said. No radio calls from the pilot had been reported, he said.

Firefighters from Fire District 14 responded to the accident scene.

The helicopter came down south of Norman Road, a two-lane rural roadway surrounded by farmland and near the Stillaguamish River. The aircraft was charred and sitting on its side when the fire was extinguished.

Records on Aviation Week's Web site show that Gable registered the Bell helicopter in July 1998. It has an average cruising speed of 78 mph.

Comments: newmedia@heraldnet.com Copyright ) 2000 The Daily Herald Co., Everett, Wash.

http://www.heraldnet.com/Stories/00/4/3/12461938.htm

==============================

-- (Dee360Degree@aol.com), April 03, 2000


Moderation questions? read the FAQ