Searchers Will Use Deep-Sea Apparatus U.S. Navy Team Will Seek Cause Of Crash Of Air Force Plane

High-tech Navy equipment will be used to search the ocean depths for wreckage from an Air Force transport plane that crashed off the Northern California coast, killing 10 reservists based in Portland.

“We are part of a team in this tragic event to determine whatever the cause may have been,” said Cmdr. Kevin Wensing, public affairs officer for the U.S. Pacific Fleet in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

The 3rd Fleet in San Diego will handle the search, but a spokesman, Cmdr. Jack Papp, said there was no estimate of when the work would begin.

The Air Force requested help because much of the wreckage from the HC-130P Hercules, along with the “black box” flight-data recorders and bodies of eight missing crew members, is believed to have sunk 5,100 feet to the ocean floor.

The Navy has high-tech, remotecontrolled underwater craft with sophisticated tracking equipment that can move along the ocean floor, transmitting pictures to help locate and retrieve wreckage.

The aircraft was flying from Portland to North Island Naval Air Station in San Diego when the crew reported mechanical problems before it crashed into the Pacific Ocean about 7 p.m. Friday 40 miles west of Cape Mendocino, Calif.

Navy and Coast Guard crews have been searching for wreckage and bodies ever since. The Coast Guard Cutter Buttonwood docked Tuesday evening with a load of wreckage, but the most important piece, a 40-foot section of wing, eluded them when jagged metal cut through a strap as crews prepared to lift it, said Lt. Craig Breitung.

Meanwhile, the crash’s only survivor was to return to the Portland Air Base around 1:30 p.m. today. Tech. Sgt. Robert T. Vogel of Albany, Ore., was being flown from Mad River Hospital in Arcata, Calif., where he was treated for injuries suffered in the crash.

Vogel, 31, was rescued from choppy seas after he floated for nearly three hours in 53-degree water, hanging on to a buoyant seat cushion.