It’s been almost a year since an Airlift Northwest helicopter plunged into Puget Sound near Edmonds, killing its pilot and two flight nurses. A month later, one of the company’s helicopters crashed while taking off from the roof of Olympia’s Providence St. Peter Hospital. No one was seriously injured.
Since then, company officials say they have begun implementing a plan aimed at improving the safety of the emergency airlift service.
The nonprofit corporation that serves Alaska and Washington created a new director position and hired Rick Hassman, a senior executive with more than 25 years of medical aviation experience, to fill the post. It installed advanced GPS equipment at its 12 most-frequently used helicopter pads. And it shifted flight nurses’ shifts from 24 to 12 hours, according to spokeswoman Mardie Rhodes.
Other changes have been slower to come.
Airlift Northwest ordered night-vision goggles that help pilots see through the dark sky, but delivery is still several months away, Rhodes said.
“The U.S. military has ordered all the ones that are available and we were told we can’t get a shipment until January 2007,” she said.
The company is also slowly replacing its aging helicopters with new models.
“After going through the tragic events that Airlift Northwest experienced last year, we knew it was essential to take a long, hard look at our operations and make sure we implement every step possible to prevent future accidents,” CEO Steve Lewis said in a press release.
The crash on Sept. 29, 2005, near Edmonds occurred as an Airlift Northwest chopper was flying from Seattle to its home base in Arlington without a patient. For an unknown reason, the helicopter crashed into Puget Sound, killing pilot Steve Smith, 59, of Whidbey Island and nurses Erin Reed, 48, and Lois Suzuki, 47, both of Seattle.
No one reported seeing the crash, but several people heard a low flying helicopter, followed by an explosion or loud boom at 9:13 p.m., according to a preliminary report by the National Transportation Safety Board.
The board’s investigation into both 2005 Airlift Northwest crashes continues. It hasn’t identified a cause for either accident.
Approximately 650 emergency medical service helicopters operate in the U.S. today, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. The number of accidents involving these helicopters nearly doubled between the mid-1990s and the industry’s rapid growth spurt in the early 2000s, according to an FAA report.
Reporter Kaitlin Manry: 425-339-3292 or kmanry@heraldnet.com.
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