Copter Crash Near Olympic Park Kills 3 5 Hurt When Chopper Goes Down During Search For A Missing Hiker

A helicopter with eight people on board crashed Friday afternoon just outside Olympic National Park while searching for a missing hiker.

Three people were killed and five injured, authorities said.

Park spokeswoman Barb Maynes said late Friday that three people aboard the helicopter were killed, a number confirmed by a Whatcom County search-and-rescue official who had a crew on site. The official asked not to be identified.

Two of the more seriously injured survivors were flown to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle.

A man in his 20s was in serious condition with facial and leg injuries and a 24-year-old woman was in satisfactory condition with leg cuts and possibly other leg injuries, a nursing supervisor said.

A 32-year-old woman and two men, both in their 20s, were taken to Olympic Memorial Hospital in Port Angeles.

All were conscious and alert and not seriously injured, nursing supervisor Sharon Means said.

The woman suffered abdominal injuries. One of the men sustained bumps and bruises and the other had a broken ankle. All were to be kept overnight.

Maynes earlier said seven people were on board and two were killed.

She said confusion on the ground and in radio communications led to the error.

The Bell 205-A1 chopper, contracted by the Park Service from Heli-Jet Corp. of Eugene, Ore., was carrying a pilot and seven passengers, Maynes said.

It went down shortly before 4 p.m. at the head of Slide Creek, which drains Mount Baldy off the north side, in the Buckhorn Wilderness Area in Olympic National Forest just east of the park boundary, she added.

A man who answered the phone Friday night at Heli-Jet confirmed a company helicopter was involved.

The man, who would not give his name, said the company often provides search helicopters to the Park Service on contract.

An emergency medical technician was on the ground near the crash scene when the helicopter went down, Maynes said.

She tended to the victims and radioed for help.

The chopper was one of five in the air Friday searching for John Devine.

The 73-year-old Sequim man has been missing since Saturday night after failing to return to his camp near Mount Baldy.

The crash occurred at one of several “helispots” that had been designated as landing sites in the search.

The sites are clear, smooth areas in the midst of rugged terrain, she said.

Devine was in excellent physical condition although legally blind in one eye, park officials said. He had hiked long distances by himself in the Olympics before.