Federal investigators say the sightseeing helicopter carrying a pilot and household of 5 visiting from Spain that crashed into the Hudson River final week was not geared up with any recording units.
In a written assertion launched over the weekend, the Nationwide Transportation Security Board mentioned, “No onboard video recorders or camera recorders have been recovered and none of the helicopter avionics onboard recorded information that could be used for the investigation.”
Divers from the NYPD continued their search into Sunday for the helicopter’s essential rotor, essential gear field, tail rotor and huge portion of the tail increase, in keeping with the NTSB. Since Thursday’s crash, the principle fuselage, together with the cockpit and cabin, in addition to the ahead portion of the tail increase and have been recovered from the river.
The Bell 206 L-4 helicopter flown by New York Helicopter Constitution Inc., had obtained a “major inspection” again on March 1, the NTSB mentioned. The chopper was in the midst of its eighth flight of the day on the time of the crash.
NTSB
NTSB
NTSB group surveying the wreckage recovered from the Bell 206 L-4 helicopter that crashed into Hudson River on April 10 close to Jersey Metropolis, New Jersey.
The helicopter took off from a downtown heliport at round 3 p.m. and flew north alongside the Manhattan skyline earlier than heading south towards the Statue of Liberty. Lower than 18 minutes into the flight, elements of the plane had been seen tumbling into the water.
Witnesses described seeing the helicopter’s tail and essential rotor breaking away and smoke pouring from the spinning chopper earlier than it slammed into the water.
Michael Roth, who owns the helicopter firm, New York Helicopter, advised The New York Put up that he would not know what went improper with the plane.
“The only thing I know by watching a video of the helicopter falling down, that the main rotor blades weren’t on the helicopter,” he mentioned, noting that he had by no means seen such a factor occur in his 30 years within the enterprise, however that, “These are machines, and they break.”
The victims included passengers Agustin Escobar, 49, his spouse, Mercè Camprubí Montal, 39, and their three youngsters, Victor, 4, Mercedes, 8, and Agustin, 10. Mercedes would have turned 9 on Friday, officers mentioned.
The pilot was Seankese Johnson, 36, a U.S. Navy veteran who obtained his business pilot’s license in 2023. He had logged about 800 hours of flight time as of March, Jennifer Homendy, chair of the Nationwide Transportation Security Board, advised reporters Friday.
The Hudson crash is bringing recent scrutiny to the security of personal helicopter flights round New York Metropolis. NBC New York’s Andrew Siff experiences.
“One of many issues we are able to do to honor these lives is to attempt to save others, as a result of if there’s one factor we all know for certain about New York Metropolis’s helicopter tour firms: they’ve a lethal monitor document, and it’s normally the businesses—not the pilots—which are overtly manipulating federal FAA guidelines, slicing corners and placing earnings over folks,” the New York Democrat mentioned.
