LAPUSH — A salvage helicopter this morning recovered about half of the Coast Guard helicopter that crashed near the mouth of the Quillayute River in LaPush on Wednesday, killing three of the four crew members.
The recovery effort began at about 7 a.m. and was suspended at about 8 a.m. due to fog, said Eric Chandler, Coast Guard Sector Seattle spokesman.
The two pieces recovered by the Ballard Diving and Salvage of Seattle helicopter were taken to the Coast Guard’s Quillayute River station in LaPush.
The MH-60T Jayhawk helicopter’s tail and tail blade remain submerged in shallow water about 400 yards off LaPush, Chandler said.
Petty Officer Nathan Bradshaw in Seattle said it will be some time before Coast Guard officials declare a cause of Wednesday’s crash.
Witnesses said the helicopter was flying low and hit power lines at James Island.
The crew was flying the Jayhawk ‘copter from Astoria, Ore., back to their base in Sitka, Alaska.
The survivor is in a Seattle hospital in serious condition with a broken arm and leg.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
Earlier report:
LAPUSH — Coast Guard personnel on Thursday continued to retrieve debris from Wednesday’s helicopter crash, which claimed the lives of three servicemen, while the full recovery effort was hampered by fog.
Spokesman Petty Officer Eric Chandler said the Coast Guard’s MH-60T Jayhawk will have to remain submerged in shallow water near the Quileute tribe’s village of LaPush until visibility improves.
The National Weather Service is predicting fog for LaPush through Monday.
A salvage helicopter will be used to recover the helicopter, said Chandler, who has been based at the Coast Guard’s Station Quillayute River in LaPush since the crash.
Lead investigator
The man who will lead the investigation into the crash, a captain from the East Coast, will make the final call as to when the skies are clear enough for the aircraft to be recovered, he said.
Chandler said he did not have the man’s name or estimated time of arrival from Washington, D.C.
Members of the Coast Guard’s crash investigation team also began to trickle into LaPush on Thursday, said spokeswoman Petty Officer Allyson Conroy.
But no further details have surfaced to explain why the pilots did not avoid power lines that caused the aircraft to crash into the water Wednesday morning.
There was no sign that the crew from Sitka, Alaska, was in distress, and any explanation could depend on recovery of the helicopter’s audio-recording system.
Unusually low
Witnesses on Wednesday said the helicopter was flying abnormally low over LaPush shortly before it flew into the power lines over the mouth of the Quillayute River around 9:30 a.m.
The crash was the Coast Guard’s deadliest since a C-130 airplane, flying near the coast of California, collided with a Marine Corps helicopter in October 2009, killing all seven on board and two Marines on the copter.
The last Coast Guard helicopter crash occurred in September 2008 in Hawaii. All four crew members on board were killed.
The lone survivor of the LaPush crash, Lt. Lance D. Leone, remained in Seattle’s Harborview Medical Center on Thursday recovering from non-life threatening injuries.
Leone, 29, of Ventura, Calif., was one of the two crew members pulled from the water by Quileute fishermen, who were the first on the scene in two skiffs.
Rescuer relieved
Quileute Marina Harbormaster Darryl Penn said Thursday that was relieved to hear that the co-pilot survived.
Penn, along with fisherman Charles Sampson, rescued Leone after the lieutenant fired a flare gun.
“It still makes me really, really happy for bringing him back to his [family] again,” he said.
Penn said he is glad that they were able to help, but still grieves for those who died.
“That part I wish still didn’t happen,” he said.
“But I’m definitely grateful we were there, to be around in a situation like that.”
Leone suffered a broken arm and a broken leg, along with some scratches.
Penn said the pilot was also covered in fuel and going into shock at the time of the rescue.
Low-voltage lines
The low-voltage power lines that the helicopter hit hung up to 400 feet above the river’s mouth and powered the Coast Guard’s fog horn and lights on James Island.
The lines, maintained by the Coast Guard, fell to the ground and water and were quickly deactivated by the electricity provider, Clallam County Public Utility District.
Chandler said there are no plans yet to restore power to the James Island safety features.
Witnesses also said the helicopter banked sharply right before it clipped the cables with its tail.
The tail section was torn apart from the aircraft, which caused it to spin downward into the water.
The crew was flying the helicopter to Sitka from Astoria, Ore.
It had been flown by a different crew to Astoria from North Carolina, where the 65-foot-long copter received updated display screens, radar and flight instruments, Conroy said.
She said each of the Coast Guard’s 60 Jayhawks are receiving the upgrades.
Healing dinner
The Quileute tribe hosted a healing dinner for Coast Guard personnel Thursday evening at LaPush.
Tribal Chairwoman Anna Rose Counsell-Geyer, through tribal spokeswoman Jackie Jacobs, said Thursday afternoon that the dinner was to be “an opportunity for conversation between the [Quileute] nation and the Coast Guard, which will begin the healing process.”
The tribe was also making counselors available to the five tribal members who pulled the two crew members from the water.
Penn said the experience has been hard on them.
“I didn’t sleep a whole lot [that night],” he said.
“It is definitely kind of a tough thing to get away from.”
The second crew member pulled from the water by the tribal members was unconscious and was described Wednesday as having “mangled legs.”
It is unknown which crew member he was.
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Reporter Tom Callis can be reached at 360-417-3532 or at tom.callis@peninsuladailynews.com.
