Copter Pilot Couldn't Check Descent, Investigators Say

Report Also Notes Faulty Height-Gauging Unit

Joseph Schaefer, the pilot, and a paramedic died in the 2005 wreck. (Family Photo Via Wusa)

Just seconds after buzzing over the Woodrow Wilson Bridge on a chilly night in early 2005, the medical helicopter entered a black void: flying 200 feet above dark water and below a moonless sky, according to investigators.

Without any visual cues outside the cockpit, the pilot apparently became disoriented. The helicopter went into a gradual descent and slammed into the river -- killing the pilot and a paramedic onboard, the National Transportation Safety Board reported yesterday. A flight nurse survived.

New details emerged yesterday about the Jan. 10 crash, one of a spate of such accidents that focused attention on the safety practices of the medical-airlift industry. It was the first of two medevac accidents in the Washington area in two years.

The safety board concluded that the accident probably was caused by the "pilot's failure to identify and arrest the helicopter's descent" into the river. The board noted that the pilot probably had been scanning the sky for a jet flying in the opposite direction and might not have been studying his instruments just before the crash.

Investigators also revealed that a key instrument on the helicopter -- a radar altimeter that measures the aircraft's distance from the ground and can alert pilots to changes in altitude -- wasn't working that night. Radar altimeters are helpful when flying low to the ground at night, but federal regulations allowed the helicopter to be flown with the faulty device for as many as 10 days.

The helicopter was flying from Washington Hospital Center to its home base in Stafford County when the accident occurred about 11:10 p.m. The crash killed the pilot, Joseph E. Schaefer III, 56, of Sterling, and his paramedic, Nicole Kielar, 29, of Henrico County. Flight nurse Jonathan Godfrey, 36 at the time, of Chesapeake Beach, Va., escaped the helicopter and clung to a piece of wreckage until he was rescued.

The NTSB report ruled out the possibility that the helicopter had hit a crane on the bridge. Citing computer analysis of radar data, it also discounted that wake turbulence from a passing jet could have played a role.

Representatives of the company that operated the helicopter, Colorado-based Air Methods, said they have taken steps to prevent such crashes. Since the accident, all of the company's helicopters are required to have working radar altimeters if they are to be flown at night, they said.

"We are very proud of our safety record," chief executive Aaron Todd said.

Schaefer, who joined Air Methods about six months before the accident, did not tell the company that his previous employer had fired him in April 2004 after two weeks of work, the NTSB report said. That company determined that Schaefer was unable to adequately perform complex tasks in the cockpit, the report said.

Brian Foster, Air Methods' director of operations, said Schaefer passed the company's tests and training programs.

An NTSB spokesman said the report took almost three years because the agency has a backlog of investigations.