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SFDAJL52
05-04-2004, 08:22 PM
http://www.wnbc.com/news/3269249/detail.html

NewsChannel 4 Chopper Crashes In Brooklyn

POSTED: 6:32 pm EDT May 4, 2004
UPDATED: 7:19 pm EDT May 4, 2004

NEW YORK -- A NewsChannel 4 helicopter covering a shooting Tuesday in Brooklyn crashed on a rooftop.

Three occupants are in serious condition, but reportedly did not suffer life-threatening injuries.

Reporter Andrew Torres escaped the crash, but the fate of the pilot was unknown, WNBC said. Police said three people were aboard and none had life-threatening injuries.

The crash occurred at about 6:21 p.m. Callers to 911 reported seeing the helicopter "fall from the sky" and onto a rooftop, police said.

The shooting had been reported in the Flatbush section.

Police and emergency officials at the scene said the crew exhibited great skill in landing the disabled craft without causing injuries on the ground.

All onboard are employees of Heli-Net of California.

In 1986, Jane Dornacker, a traffic reporter for WNBC radio in New York, was killed when her helicopter crashed into the Hudson River. The pilot was critically injured.

As the chopper plunged toward a pier, listeners heard Dornacker scream at the pilot, "Hit the water! Hit the water!"

The Federal Aviation Administration later accused the helicopter company of making faulty repairs on the chopper. Dornacker's daughter reached a $325,000 settlement with the owner and manufacturer of the helicopter.

WNBC debuted television news via Chopper 4, April 18, 1995, on "Live at Five." It provides NewsChannel 4 with live aerial shots for up-to-the-minute coverage of breaking news.


It appears that there are no fatalities at this point thankfully. My question is to the FDNY guys what is protocol for something like this?

SafetyPro
05-04-2004, 09:14 PM
Just saw a video of the crash on our local news. :eek: Chopper was gyrating and spinning wildly prior to coming in on a large roof (looked like a brick apartment building or similar). Took out the parapet and the chopper just broke in half and fell a couple stories to the neighboring rooftop. Its amazing there weren't fatalities. No fire though from what they showed.

FFFRED
05-04-2004, 09:26 PM
10-60 transmitted for Brooklyn Box 3729 Cortelyou Rd. at Lott St.
2 lines stretched-1 of them a foam line.
Reported: 3- 10-45 code 2s.
Primary and Secondary searches negative.

Building was a two story brick MD. Exposure 4 has some damage on the parapet.

FTM-PTB

WTFD10
05-05-2004, 12:03 AM
Pretty amazing video of it going down and then one of the crew climbing out and staggering around.

I'm suprised to see that a shooting in NYC would bring out 3 helicopters. Even those of us in "the sticks" (AKA the rest of the country to you New Yorkers) don't make that big a deal over a shooting. I wouldn't figure that it would be chopper-worthy in NYC.

FFFRED
05-05-2004, 12:41 AM
www.wabc.com

Footage (http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/news/video/wabc_050404_chopper_video2.htm l)

They played the whole footage on WNBC or WABC tonight...it shows the chopper taking a nose dive and barely recovering in time to avoid the roof tops.

Also www.wnbc.com

FTM-PTB

E40FDNYL35
05-05-2004, 07:46 AM
three very lucky men...

NJFFSA16
05-05-2004, 11:18 AM
It looks like all 3 occupants will live to tell their story. It might inspire them to make a career change to firefighting....;) The news business is much too dangerous...eh Ray?:D

Kudos to the pilot. He did one heck of a job...despite the results.

MattyJ
05-05-2004, 06:03 PM
The reason for the heavy media coverage is because it was a police involved shooting.

len1582
05-05-2004, 11:51 PM
Those guys are luckier than you think. If you see the video or the pictures notice the alley between the brick building and the one they landed on.At one point it looked as though they could have gone nose first down into the alley.That would have been very difficult to come out of. Hey "any landing you can walk away from..."

arhaney
05-06-2004, 12:28 AM
One of our firemen is a Helicopter pilot for our large medical center, he was like "Holy Cow"..... Those guys were truly luckey. Check out the NTSB website in a few days and they will have a prelim. report on the accident. Any word on injuries? Here is the NTSB website link: http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/month.asp