ALAMOSA, Colo.—Three people were presumed dead after their medical plane slammed into a mountainside Friday, leaving wreckage described by rescuers as “catastrophic.”
The body of one crew member was recovered from the wreckage and authorities concluded no one else could have survived the impact, said Dustin Duncan of the International Association of Air Medical Services, who was acting as a spokesman for the plane’s owner, Eagle Air Med Inc.
The plane had disappeared during a flight from Chinle, Ariz., to Alamosa and appeared to be on descent when it crashed into the mountain, Duncan said. There wasn’t any sign that the crew had been attempting an emergency landing in mountainous terrain just west of the Continental Divide near 11,677-foot high Charleys Peak, which is about 35 miles southwest of Alamosa.
High winds and fog prevented an air search Friday morning, but the weather cleared enough around noon for the search to begin, Archuleta Undersheriff John Weiss said. The plane was spotted about 1:45 p.m.
Barbara Anne Smith, a Conejos County sheriff administrator, said an emergency locator transmitter helped pinpoint the plane’s location.
Flight controllers lost radio and radar contact with the twin-engine Beech King Air C-90A at 11:20 p.m. Thursday, said Mike Fergus, a Federal Aviation Administration spokesman. Its last known location was estimated at about 20 miles southwest of Alamosa.
A pilot, flight nurse and paramedic were on the plane, Fergus said. FAA spokesman Ian Gregor originally said the plane took off from Phoenix, but later said the plane was headed from Chinle, Ariz., to Alamosa.
The body recovered from the wreckage hasn’t been identified and authorities may have to use DNA or dental records to identify other remains found there, Duncan said.
The plane is registered to Scenic Aviation Inc. out of Blanding, Utah, which operates the air ambulance service Eagle Air Med. Its crew were on their way to pick up a patient in Alamosa to transport that person to Colorado Springs, Duncan said.
Duncan said the company has a plane based out of Alamosa—about 160 miles southwest of Denver—but that the company’s Chinle-based plane was en route to pick up a patient because the other plane was on a call.
Despite the risk of air medical transport, Duncan said such companies provide a valuable service in the West by getting patients from rural areas to urban trauma centers in the critical minutes after accidents and emergencies.
“Lives are saved everyday by crews similar to those involved in this mishap today,” he said.
