Helicopter crashes into New York’s Hudson River with six dead including three children | World | News
The company behind Thursday’s tragic helicopter crash is facing scrutiny after the fatal accident, which claimed the lives of a Spanish tech CEO, Agustin Escobar, as well as four of his family members and the pilot.
New York Helicopter has been flying tours around New York City for years, but this crash was not their first. In 2013, one of their choppers was forced into an emergency landing on the Hudson River, near Manhattan.
The flight was carrying a family of four from Sweden, who escaped unharmed after the chopper was abled to deploy flotation devices to keep it upright in the water.
In 2015, shortly after takeoff, one New York Helicopter pilot was forced into a hard landing while hovering 20 feet above the ground.
This aircraft had been involved in a similar incident five years before, and was found to have an “unairworthy” drive shaft, the New York Times has reported.
Like the one involved in the fatal crash on the Hudson, Thursday, this helicopter was a Bell 206 model leased from Meridian Helicopters in Louisiana.