Rescue helicopters bring Air Tindi crew and passengers to safety

Passengers and crew whose Air Tindi charter came down in remote NWT tundra have returned safely to Yellowknife.

The Twin Otter aircraft, on skis, suffered an as-yet unspecified incident at lunchtime on Wednesday in an area some 300 km northeast of the territorial capital.

There were no fatalities among the two crew and eight passengers, but some people are understood to have suffered broken limbs.

Three search-and-rescue technicians joined the group late on Wednesday evening, parachuting down from an overhead Hercules aircraft sent from Winnipeg to assist.

Rescue helicopters reached the accident site on Thursday morning and transferred the crew, passengers and technicians – 13 people in all – to the nearby Diavik diamond mine. Medevac aircraft were waiting at Diavik to take casualties to Yellowknife for treatment.

By 4:30pm, the 13 had all arrived in Yellowknife.

According to Air Tindi president Chris Reynolds, the aircraft – a private charter – came down on a lake in the vicinity of its originally intended destination.

The Joint Rescue Coordination Centre in Trenton, Ontario gave the accident site as 16 km southeast of Diavik, which is near the NWT-Nunavut border.

While strong winds complicated rescue efforts on Wednesday, those winds eased and visibility improved overnight, allowing helicopters to reach the group on Thursday morning.

Diavik helps rescue effort

Diavik owner Rio Tinto said the mine’s emergency response team travelled to the downed aircraft on Wednesday evening, reaching the site on two snowmobiles at around 9pm.

“They brought survival and medical equipment, provided assistance to the affected individuals and supported the Department of Defence’s search and rescue specialists,” Rio Tinto spokesperson Simon Letendre told Cabin Radio by email.

The mine made its airstrip available for Thursday’s rescue effort.

“The airstrip will be used to coordinate the medevacs and patient extrication,” Letendre wrote, “and the mine site will provide medical support and aircraft fuel as required.”

Great Slave and Acasta HeliFlight helicopters were involved in the rescue mission, Air Tindi said.

Acasta president Adam Bembridge said the three companies had been “strategizing” since late Wednesday night about the best approach.

Three A-Star helicopters were dispatched to the accident site, Bembridge said, to pick up the group and transfer them to Diavik and onward flights to Yellowknife.

“In these situations, you work closely with your competitors and the affected company and you just send the right people on the job and make sure we’re thinking of every eventuality,” Bembridge said.

Two with ‘moderate to serious’ injuries

David Lavallee, a spokesperson for JRCC Trenton, earlier said six people had minor injuries and two had “moderate to serious” injuries but were “showing signs of improvement.” He said the technicians from the Hercules had provided initial medical care and set up shelters.

The three technicians circled the site for more than an hour on Wednesday night before strong winds eased enough to allow a jump, Reynolds said. The technicians, passengers and crew spent the night in heated tents.

More: Safety board formally opens Air Tindi crash investigation

Reynolds praised the technicians who raced from Winnipeg aboard the Hercules, then jumped in poor conditions, for their bravery.

“In the middle of the night, in the subarctic, with 70 km/h winds and very poor visibility, those search-and-rescue technicians are something else,” he said.

Reynolds said two people were understood to be badly hurt but their outlook was as good as it could be.

The search-and-rescue technicians had “been thrilled with their stability overnight and how everything has been going,” Reynolds said, “and our medics are very happy with the same.”