Previous accidents included a 2007 case in which a helicopter crash-landed in the Hudson from a height of 500 feet, but without injuring passengers a 2008 incident in which one helicopter taking off clipped another on the ground a 2008 incident in which a pilot caused "substantial damage" to a helicopter while landing during an instructional session. Hersman said the NTSB has recorded eight accidents and one "incident" involving Liberty, but Saturday's crash was the first to involve fatalities. The plane took off from a Philadelphia-area airfield Saturday morning, landed at New Jersey's Teterboro Airport and was bound for Ocean City, New Jersey, with three people aboard - the owner and pilot, Steven Altman, 60, of Ambler, Pennsylvania his brother, Daniel Altman, 49, of Dresher, Pennsylvania and Daniel Altman's son Douglas, 16.Ĭontrollers lost contact with the plane at 11:53 a.m., when it was at an altitude of about 1,100 feet, Hersman said. His passengers were Michele Norelli, 51 Fabio Gallazzi, 49 Filippo Norelli, 16 Giacomo Gallazzi, 15 and Tiziana Pedroni, 44, all of Bologna, Italy. He had worked for the operator, Liberty Helicopter Sightseeing Tours, for about a year and a half and had 2,700 helicopter flight hours, Hersman said. New York police identified the pilot of the helicopter as Jeremy Clark, 32. The helicopter was taking the five Italians on a 12-minute sightseeing tour around New York and had taken off from a heliport in midtown Manhattan shortly before the crash, she said.
![i39 accident hudson victom identfied i39 accident hudson victom identfied](https://cdn20.patchcdn.com/users/22881893/20170112/113954/styles/T800x600/public/article_images/crash-1484239164-6418.jpg)
Most of the Eurocopter AS350 had been lifted out of the Hudson on Sunday and taken to a pier in Hoboken, New Jersey, across the river from Manhattan, for examination, Hersman said. Nothing has been ruled out at this point in time," she said. Investigators are trying to establish the facts of the crash but won't determine the probable cause for some time, Hersman said. Neither aircraft was required to carry electronic "black boxes" that record cockpit voices and flight data on larger planes, but electronic navigational devices on board might retain some information that could help the probe, Hersman said. Seven bodies had been pulled out of the river by Sunday afternoon, Hersman said.Īuthorities believe none of the nine people aboard the two aircraft survived the crash. Nine people, including five Italian tourists, were aboard the two aircraft when they collided over the river shortly before noon Saturday. The search stopped as a storm approached Sunday evening and will resume Monday morning, police said. “They had a magical connection.New York police said they believed side-scan sonar pointed them to the wreckage of the Piper Saratoga PA-32 just north of where the helicopter went down, but Deborah Hersman, chairwoman of the National Transportation Safety Board, said swift current and low visibility were hindering divers. “Everybody can say that they are friends, that they loved their siblings, or whatever they want, but those two were unique,” she told the newspaper. A funeral service will be held in Pocatello on Friday. State police believe they know what caused the wreck, but that information won’t be released until an investigation is complete, the Idaho State Journal reports.īobbi Neibaur said a friend of the family told her the teens - who were born 15 months apart - died together because God couldn’t take just one of them, saying they couldn’t live without each other. But the teens were no longer behind their parents as they approached McCammon, prompting the elder Eric to slow down and call another relative, who told him the teens had had an accident. Prior to the fatal wreck, the teens’ parents, Eric and Bobbi Neibaur, had been driving ahead of them, making sure everything was OK with frequent peeks in the rearview mirrors.
![i39 accident hudson victom identfied i39 accident hudson victom identfied](http://wkdk.com/wp-content/uploads/bfi_thumb/dreamstime_m_9548569-1-om65tzu8rb6owa603mjxl8p749qhcrh11uuk9utzfk.jpg)
Neither official was identified by the newspaper. Meanwhile, a Bannock County sheriff’s deputy - who was met by relatives as they tried to extricate the trapped victims - was so deeply shaken that he was given the day off to recuperate. The teens were on their way back from a dirt bike-riding and camping trip in Island Park when a pickup truck driven by Eric drifted into the eastbound lane and slammed into an SUV driven by Jay Lanningham, 70, of Nampa, the Idaho State Journal reports.Īll three were pronounced dead at the scene. The emergency responder with Bannock County Search and Rescue who went into cardiac arrest while pulling bodies from the crumpled vehicles is expected to survive. A sister and brother were killed in a triple fatal head-on collision so gruesome that an emergency responder nearly died when he suffered a massive heart attack at the catastrophic accident site.Įric Neibaur, 15, and his 13-year-old sister, Lauren, were killed Sunday in a head-on crash on US 30 near McCammon, Idaho.