Helicopter investigation

Air accident investigators are preparing to examine the wreckage of a helicopter which crashed in a North Uist loch.

The aircraft was badly damaged after colliding with the water on Loch Scadavay last Wednesday.

The pilot of the AS350 Squirrel was killed in the tragedy. Father-of-two Peter Clunas, 59, from Aberdeenshire, was the only person onboard the aircraft. which was lifting a rowing boat - suspended underneath - at the time.

The PDG-owned helicopter was on the island for a salmon farm charter but it is believed the aircraft was not involved on fish farm duties when the crash occurred.

Findings of the AAIB investigation are likely to be published in around nine months.

Marine salvage experts were called in to help with the “complex operation” of lifting the semi-submerged wreckage from the loch said the Air Accident Investigation Branch (AAIB) which has launched a probe into the crash.

Now recovered from the water, the mangled wreckage - along with sheared-off parts and its damaged rotor blades - was craned onto a truck for transportation to the AAIB’s base in Farnborough.

Divers attached huge inflated airbags to the partially sunken aircraft before slowly winching it from the centre channel of the loch towards the shore.

Lack of deep water posed a problem and the wreckage came to rest on shallow ground a short distance away from a shore side quay.

Despite the challenge of squally weather and strong wind gusts the helicopter was taken ashore with a lorry crane lifting it the last stretch from the loch.

Alan Thorne, a senior inspector with the AAIB, co-ordinated the salvage operation.

Mr Thorne stressed it is “too early to come to any conclusions” over the possible cause of the crash.

He added: “We are looking at all the aspects of the accident. Not only the technical aspects of the helicopter but also the nature of the flight, the planning for the flight and the load it was carrying.”

Three people who saw the crash tried in vain to rescue the pilot.

Immediately, they raised the alarm and - in a desperate bid to aid Mr Clunas - they rowed out in another boat to the sinking aircraft.

They recovered the pilot to the shore where he was pronounced dead.

An ambulance took him to the Balivanich hospital.

Investigators to examine helicopter wreckage after crash

20 June 2018