Relief chopper crashes

A HELICOPTER on a humanitarian mission crashed into the Manila Bay several kilometers off Bulacan yesterday afternoon. The pilot and a passenger were rescued by US Marines.

“We were on our way to Manila from Tacloban when the chopper had a mayday call. So we informed Villamor that we will delay our landing to rescue those inside the chopper,” Major Jason Kaufmann, pilot of the US Marine C-130 aircraft, told Inquirer.net in a phone interview.

The chopper crashed four miles from the Hagonoy shoreline and the two survivors swam for help.

“They still had their radios and we were able to maintain contact with them. We flew our C-130 very low, at 200 feet above the waters and we deployed our rafts,” Kaufmann said.

He added that they informed Villamor Air Base of the location of the chopper crash and the survivors so they could be rescued, adding that they had no flotation gear.

Local fishermen on a fishing boat, meanwhile, were able to rescue the survivors about 30 minutes after the rafts were deployed.

Kaufmann said the two occupants of the chopper were uninjured.

Philippine Air Force spokesman Col. Miguel Ernesto Okol clarified that the chopper that crashed was a private one and not from the military. /Inquirer