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Story originally printed in the Winona Daily News or online at www.winonadailynews.com

TOWN OF MEDARY, Wis. — Federal investigators today will continue trying to determine why a Madison hospital helicopter crashed on a bluff east of La Crosse late Saturday killing all three aboard.

Firefighters located the UW Hospital Med Flight about 8:25 a.m. Sunday on a wooded hillside about half-mile from Keil Coulee Road in the town of Medary, said Onalaska Fire Chief Don Dominick.

The helicopter crashed shortly after refueling at the La Crosse Municipal Airport at about

10:30 p.m. Saturday on a return flight to Madison, said La Crosse County Sheriff Steve Helgeson.

Dr. Darren Bean, nurse Mark Coyne, and pilot Steve Lipperer were killed.

It was the first Med Flight crash since the program began in 1985.

More than 75 doctors, nurses, pilots and patients have died in medical helicopter crashes across the country in the past decade as the workers risk their lives to transport patients in need of medical care.

The smell of jet fuel lingered as three Federal Aviation Administration investigators arrived on scene late Sunday afternoon to comb the wreckage and piece together answers.

Investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board, the agency in charge, will begin working today, Helgeson said. The investigation is expected to take at least three or four days, he said.

An autopsy is planned today for Lipperer as required by the FAA, said La Crosse County Administrator Steve O’Malley.

There was no fire when the American Eurocopter EC 135 crashed on the eastern slope of the bluff.

Debris from the aircraft hung in trees and littered a 11/2 acre crash site Sunday. Black sneakers, a baseball cap and a cell phone lay between the red tail and the mangled cabin. A piece of medical equipment emitted a piercing beep.

The helicopter left the UW Hospital about 8:30 p.m. Saturday to pick up a patient in Prairie du Chien, Wis., for transport to Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center, said UW Hospital spokeswoman Lisa Brunette. Who the patient was or the circumstances for the transport weren’t clear.

Gundersen Lutheran’s Med Link helicopter was responding to a crash in Arcadia, Wis.

It’s not unusual for Med Flight to assist in such cases, Brunette said.

Helgeson said the helicopter left the airport after refueling about 10:30 p.m. The airport tower was closed at that time, so takeoff time cannot be confirmed, said airport Manager Dan Wruck.

At 10:30 p.m., visibility measured eight miles, said Jeff Raberding, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in La Crosse. It was overcast with light rain falling and calm winds, he said.

Mark Hanson, program director for Med Flight, said the pilot checked the weather before leaving Madison, and there was no concern. He said the pilot had flown to La Crosse on previous trips.

The pilot was operating visually and not relying on instruments, Hanson said. He said he didn’t know why.

Contact with the helicopter ceased shortly after takeoff, said La Crosse County Sheriff’s Chief Deputy Jeff Wolf.

UW Hospital called the La Crosse Emergency Dispatch Center at 11:15 p.m. Saturday to say communication had been lost with the helicopter, Dominick said. There was no patient aboard the craft and the hospital was not expecting to hear from the crew until they neared Madison.

Crews began looking for the aircraft when the emergency call came through and narrowed their search using 911 calls from neighbors who heard a loud noise, Dominick said.

‘No big, glaring problems’

The helicopter was leased last year from Air Methods, Van Bree said. Med Flight also started leasing its second helicopter last year from Air Methods.

The two helicopters, along with several others, were grounded for about a week a month ago because of “paperwork issues,” Hanson said. There were no mechanical problems that led to the grounding, he said.

“These particular helicopters are the most popular make and model of helicopters used in EMS across the country,” Hanson said.

Air Methods owns about 350 helicopters, leasing them to emergency medical services around the country, said company spokesman Craig Yale.

“All machines have bugs that have be worked out sometimes,” Yale said. “But there were no big, glaring problems with the aircraft.”

The last fatal crash involving one of the company’s helicopters was in Southern California in December, 2006, Yale said.

Med Flight’s other helicopter won’t fly again until the FAA says it can, Hanson said.

Fog hampered searchers

Fog, new spring foliage, and rough terrain made the search difficult and wore on crews combing the bluffs, he said. Helgeson said the weather prohibited the use of airplanes or helicopters.

“Firefighters aren’t going to say they’re tired,” Dominick said. “Fortunately, I know the faces of some.”

Thirty-three firefighters from Onalaska, West Salem, Holmen and nearby towns as well as multiple law enforcement agencies helped with the search.

The wreckage was found about 400 yards from Randy Viner and Deborah Rice-Viner’s 31 acre property on Keil Coulee Road. Viner helped locate the wreckage while searching on an all terrain vehicle.

“It’s too bad this had to happen to these people,” Viner said. “It is sad that these people got killed here.”

NTSB: Most crashes at night

From 1998 to 2005, according to the NTSB, 89 medical helicopter crashes killed 75 people; 47 of the incidents were at night.

In 2006, after an apparent increase in crashes in previous years drew considerable public attention, researchers from John Hopkins University reported on an analysis of medical helicopter crashes since 1983.

The researchers said 56 percent of the fatal crashes were at night, and 77 percent occurred when weather conditions required pilots to fly primarily by instruments instead of using visual cues.

It was not known Sunday how many medical helicopter crashes have occurred since 2005.

But in a letter to Congress in May 2007, the Association of Air Medical Services cited a “dramatic reduction” in the number of such accidents in the previous 18 months.

In June, in a different kind of medical tragedy, a Cessna 550 airplane carrying two pilots and four members of the University of Michigan’s organ transplant team crashed in Lake Michigan after takeoff from Milwaukee, killing everyone on board.

Title: UW Hospital Med Flight Crash
Date: May. 11th, 2008
A UW Hospital Med Flight helicopter crashed in the wooded coulee's of the Town Of Medary Saturday night at about 10:30 p.m. Saturday. The piolot, a doctor and nurse died in the crash.
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