Three people died on Thursday afternoon after two helicopters collided in midair near McMinnville Municipal Airport in Oregon and crashed into a farm field beside a highway, authorities said.
Yamhill County Sheriff Sam Elliott identified the victims at a news conference on Friday as Tyler Delane Sturdevant, 38, of Newberg, Oregon; Maddie Aasbo, 22, a flight instructor from Texas; and Christopher James Joughin, 31, a student pilot from the United Kingdom.
Sturdevant was the sole occupant of one helicopter, while Aasbo and Joughin were aboard the other, the sheriff said.
Investigators are now trying to establish how two aircraft flying near a small, uncontrolled airport came to collide in daylight, a question that matters for every pilot who flies into fields without a control tower.
Witnesses told investigators the helicopters were about 500 feet above the ground when they struck each other, according to National Transportation Safety Board air safety investigator Grant Mills.
Leo Rodriguez, who was working on the roof of a barn at his family’s nearby winery, told CNN affiliate KPTV that he heard a loud bang and looked up to see the two aircraft already falling.
“All of a sudden I hear this big boom and this metal breaking, and I look up and just see these two helicopters just collided in mid-air,” Rodriguez said.
“It took me a while for my brain to figure out what I was seeing. You don’t see this every day. They twisted and fell to the ground,” he added.
The collision happened at about 2:10 p.m. local time on Thursday, October 29, about one mile east of McMinnville Municipal Airport, officials said.
McMinnville is about 40 miles southwest of Portland, in Oregon’s Willamette Valley wine country.
Deputies found the wreckage of a 1995 Robinson R22 and a 2018 Airbus AS350B3 in a private farm field next to Highway 233, the sheriff’s office said.
One helicopter, described as red, was left crumpled in pieces, while the other, described as green, lay upside down in the field, according to officials.
A one-mile stretch of Highway 233 remained closed on Friday, the Oregon Department of Transportation said, giving no estimate for reopening.
The Robinson R22 was on an instructional flight, while the Airbus was on a post-maintenance check flight, the NTSB said.
Sturdevant was a pilot and check airman who had previously served as operations director for Newberg-based Precision Helicopter, according to local reporting.
Jerry Trimble Helicopters, a flight training school based at McMinnville Municipal Airport, confirmed that one of its aircraft was involved in the crash.
“Jerry Trimble Helicopters is deeply saddened to confirm that one of our aircraft was involved in an aviation incident this afternoon,” the company said in a statement.
“Our hearts and thoughts are with the individuals involved, their families, and everyone affected by this event,” the company added.
The company said it is cooperating with authorities in the investigation.
An early account from the Federal Aviation Administration had given different occupant numbers for the two aircraft, but the sheriff’s office later confirmed that two people were in the Robinson and one person was in the Airbus.
NTSB investigators arrived at the scene on Friday morning and spent the day documenting the crash site, Mills said at a Friday news conference.
“We expect to be completed with the on-scene and recovery later this evening,” Mills said on Friday.
“Tomorrow, we will be conducting interviews with witnesses and the operators of the aircraft,” he added.
Investigators were working on Friday to retrieve equipment containing flight instrument data from the Airbus, Mills said.
The agency was still determining whether the Robinson R22 carried similar equipment, he said.
McMinnville Municipal Airport has no air traffic control tower, so pilots are expected to report their positions to each other on a shared radio frequency when they are near the airport, Mills said.
The FAA will examine the communications side of the crash, while the NTSB leads the overall investigation with help from the FAA and the manufacturers of the airframes and engines, officials said.
Investigators stressed that their early work is limited to gathering perishable evidence, not determining a cause.
“We are here to gather perishable evidence, just the facts, and we are not here to determine the probable causes,” Mills said, according to local reporting of the briefing.
The wreckage is being moved to a secure facility at an undisclosed location for examination, according to the Statesman Journal.
No cause for the collision has been announced, and officials have not said where either helicopter was coming from or going to.
The NTSB said it expects to issue a preliminary report within about 30 days, with a final report in 12 to 24 months.
Anyone who witnessed the crash has been asked to contact investigators at witness@ntsb.gov.
