A preliminary report related to a helicopter crash that killed an Emporia native and two other flight crew members last month indicates bird activity at the site of the crash, including one bird in the flight control system.
The report from the National Transportation Safety Board says a dead goose was “embedded” in the flight control servo, while carcasses of an unlisted number of geese were in the debris field when the Air Evac medical helicopter crashed late Jan. 20. Feather samples were taken for “more detailed identification.”
The NTSB report says the helicopter carrying flight nurse Adam Tebben and two other Air Evac employees had dropped off a patient at Mercy Health Center in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, at 11:23 pm. The helicopter was returning to its home base in Weatherford, Oklahoma, which is about 70 miles due west of Oklahoma City, and was flying at between 500-600 feet at around 125 mph. The company GPS monitoring system lost track of the helicopter around 11:30 pm. The helicopter was found in a field about 1.5 miles east of Hydro, around 10 miles east of Weatherford, and NTSB says the helicopter was “substantially damaged” when authorities found it.
Final reports can take up to two years to complete.
