Australian Helicopter crashed in Indonesia
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An Australian Navy helicopter carrying 11 personnel has crashed in Indonesia, the Department of Defence said.
In a statement, Defence said the Navy Sea King helicopter crashed near Gunung Sitoli on Nias Island, off the west coast of Sumatra, about 7.30pm (AEST) Saturday.
Hope the crew are alrite.
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From ninemsn: http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=13564
Nine Australians die in Navy helicopter
23:44 AEDT Sat Apr 2 2005
Tragedy has struck Australia's relief effort on Nias, with a Navy helicopter crashing, killing nine personnel on board.
The chopper crashed Saturday afternoon while on approach to Amandraya village on the remote west coast of Nias.
The Sea King helicopter had been ferrying an emergency medical team from the Kanimbla to the village as part of relief efforts to outlying areas of Nias following a devastating earthquake on Monday.
The helicopter crashed on approach to land, Kanimbla captain Commander George McGuire told journalists who had been on board the Kanimbla for a media tour.
He said two on board the helicopter survived and were airlifted to the Kanimbla for emergency surgery by the ship's second helicopter, which landed with a medical team after seeing smoke from the crash site.
"They are in a serious condition with leg fractures and other injuries," Cmdr McGuire said.
"We believe the rest of the personnel died."
On board the chopper were five naval personnel as well as three from the Air Force and one member of the Army.
Seven of the dead were male and two were female.
The Kanimbla immediately scrambled its second helicopter to inspect the crash zone for a second time after Indonesian military authorities in the area suggested the other nine passengers on board may have survived.
But an hour later the 300 ship's crew members were informed that all nine had been killed, their bodies found in the wreckage by a team of paramedics and rescue personnel.
Cmdr McGuire immediately dispatched the Kanimbla to the rescue site and it was steaming around the southern tip of Nias to take up station near a river leading to the village where the chopper crashed.
"That location is a very remote location," he said, adding that the trip would take about six hours to steam to the site where the chopper, callsign "Shark 02", went down.
Shattered staff on the Kanimbla cried and bowed their heads in shock in the ship's mess room when Cmdr McGuire broke the news that no other survivors had been found.
In the ship's cavernous hold, which had been converted into an emergency hospital ward, about 20 military doctors were caring for the two wounded crew members, conducting on-the-spot X-rays in preparation for surgery.
The Navy confirmed that all nine personnel killed in the crash were Australians.
Both pilots were killed and the two survivors were both male.
One had fractures and the other was believed to be in a very critical condition.
The Navy confirmed that those killed were the five naval personnel, three from the Air Force and one Army member.
Journalists on board the Kanimbla were barred from reporting news of the crash until all family members had been informed and the second helicopter on board Kanimbla had confirmed no more survivors.
The Kanimbla had only just reached the area on Saturday morning after steaming from Singapore, where crew had been enjoying shore leave after a three-month posting to Aceh.
The rescue mission was the second of the day and both helicopters earlier had returned from Peruk Dalam, on the south of the island, where they had airlifted four Indonesians to the ship for emergency care.
The Kanimbla has a fully equipped operating theatre with two doctors and two anaesthetists who had been operating through the afternoon and night and were fighting to save the life of their critically injured crewmate. -
a sad week made worse with another sad day..
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1st was a SH60 USN.
2nd is a SeaKing.
Lack of maintenance lah. Lets hope our RSAF can do us proud! -
sometimes i wonder why do we help those indonesians???? do they ever appreciate????
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while trying to save others, dey passed away in the line of service...
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RIP to the brave and caring soldiers.
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Are people still wasting time, money and lives to help the Indonesians?
The Indonesians are happily concentrating on wrecking foreign embassies and squabbling over deserted islands while other people tidy u their mess.
When will people wake up? -
as the saying goes, Shan you shan bao....
so no matter what, if you can help, you help...heaven always blesses the people who helps...though you cannot see it tangibly (like no sever drought in sg, no earthquake or econ. collapse in sg, etc)...
shi be shou gen you fu...
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some crazy indonesians does not mean all indonesians are mad. For those who were directly helped by the sg gov, of course they are happy that they are there. But for those who were not at the scene such things seems very remote to them hence they do not appreciate the full picture of it.but still, if we have the capacity to help, we should help .
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no news is good newsOriginally posted by Manager433:1st was a SH60 USN.
2nd is a SeaKing.
Lack of maintenance lah. Lets hope our RSAF can do us proud! -
sad for the families of those military who died helping.
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True.Originally posted by CenturionMBT:some crazy indonesians does not mean all indonesians are mad. For those who were directly helped by the sg gov, of course they are happy that they are there. But for those who were not at the scene such things seems very remote to them hence they do not appreciate the full picture of it.but still, if we have the capacity to help, we should help .
And like I said before, we helped the Acehnese people, enemy of the Javanese.
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. . . . .you missed my point completely . . . . .Originally posted by tvdog:True.
And like I said before, we helped the Acehnese people, enemy of the Javanese. -
How it crash? Due to bad weather or Terrorism MANPAD?
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There gos the tax-peyers money...