On its final flight, the pilot was conducting a short-haul insertion of two searchers from the
Honolulu Police Department using a Billy Pugh rescue net 50-feet below the helicopter.
After the pilot departed the staging area with the two HPD searchers in the net, a
previously placed searcher radioed the pilot of Air 1 three times. He advised the pilot,
"Pete, it's just too soupy up here, your gonna have to take 'em back down. I can't even see
the other side of the river." A review of the recorded voice communications revealed that
there was no verbal acknowledgment from the pilot. Shortly thereafter, a searcher heard a
crash or impact sound followed briefly by a sound of the helicopter engine noise spooling
up then down and then silence.
xii
Pilot Peter Crown and Honolulu police officers Bryant Bayne and Tate Kahaki were killed in the
accident.
The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause(s) of this
accident as follows: the pilot's poor judgment by intentionally flying into adverse weather
conditions in mountainous terrain with an external load and no observer which resulted in
loss of aircraft control. Factors were pressure from the conditions/events and a lack of total
experience in the type of operation.
xiii
Fog rolled in, visibility reduced and the ceiling dropped
September 12, 1997 was the fifth day of a search for 73 year-old John Devine, who went on a hike
around Mt. Baldy in Olympic National Park. 150 people from a dozen rescue groups, including
several from Canada, a CAP plane, and 5 helicopters, were used to assist in the rescue.
On that fifth day of the search, a Bell 205 A1 helicopter was rented from a private company in
Eugene Oregon. The helicopter attempted to pick up rescuers from the peak at the end of their
assignment.
The pilot advised the SAR personnel to load quick, as he had no intentions of spending the
night there. The pilot held up five fingers to ground personnel, who assumed that meant to
wait 5 minutes for the obscuration to clear. However, in less than that time, the helicopter
performed a vertical takeoff in the obscuration. According to the remaining SAR personnel,
they lost sight of the helicopter about 50 feet agl. They continued to hear the helicopter
throughout its climb, impact, and as it fell down the side of the mountain towards H10. The
sound of the tumbling helicopter was described by several witnesses as that of an
avalanche and caused several SAR personnel to take cover.
Witnesses reported that the weather conditions in the accident area were instrument
meteorological conditions (IMC) with very low ceiling and visibility less than 1/4 mile in fog.
The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause(s) of this
accident as follows. the pilot's intentional flight into known adverse weather conditions in
mountainous terrain.
xiv
Eight people were on board when it crashed in the Buckhorn Wilderness area just east of the park
boundary on the north side of Mt. Baldy. The crash occurred at approximately 5,600 feet. Three
rescuers died (although witnesses report that many more would have died were it not for the
expert care by rescuers on scene who were waiting for their turn to be evacuated when the
helicopter returned).
