2 of 5 Seriously Hurt as SDG&E; Copter Crashes

A San Diego Gas & Electric Co. helicopter surveying land near Barrett Junction in East County struck a company power line Wednesday morning and dropped 30 feet to the ground, seriously injuring two of the five people on board and triggering grass fires that burned about an acre.

“We were flying along just fine, and then we hit the line and went into a spin,” said Alan Duback, who was sitting in the rear of the Bell Jet LongRanger and escaped with only a bruised shoulder. Duback said it was his first helicopter flight for the company.

“We spun around once, then we were falling down the ridge. I was lucky,” said Duback, 39, an SDG&E; mapping survey supervisor.

Duback said he and Tom Wojtasiak, 37, a survey operations supervisor, crawled from the wreckage just after 9 a.m. and called for help from the nearby Barrett Cafe.

Second Copter to Rescue

Sheriff’s deputies sent in an ASTREA helicopter, which airlifted the pilot and remaining two passengers to California 94.

Don Grove, 57, an SDG&E; property acquisition supervisor, and Jim Clark, 45, a pilot for Western Helicopters of El Cajon, were taken by Life Flight helicopter to Sharp Memorial Hospital, where they were listed in serious condition. Grove has a fractured vertebra and head lacerations, and Clark has two fractured vertebrae, said SDG&E; spokesman Fred Vaughn.

The other three SDG&E; employees on board--Duback, Wojtasiak and Mike Danna, 44, a senior licensing specialist who fractured a vertebra--were taken by ambulance to Grossmont District Hospital in La Mesa and later released.

Speaking from his hospital bed, Clark, the pilot, confirmed that the helicopter struck the line before developing engine trouble.

But John Hamrick, SDG&E; vice president of administrative services, said his “best information,” pending an investigation, was that the craft, leased from Western for the past year and a half, lost power before falling into the 12,000-volt wire and snapping it.

Company spokesmen quoted both Clark and Wojtasiak as saying there was an engine malfunction before the power line was hit.

Pilot Called a Veteran

“The pilot is very, very experienced. He patrols our big transmission line, which has 500,000 volts. It was an engine malfunction, according to the pilot,” said Hamrick.

But Bill Dvorak, director of maintenance for the helicopter company, stated flatly that Clark flew into the line. “We have no reason to suspect it was a mechanical failure,” he added.

The broken power line, which Duback said fell 15 or 20 feet away from the crash site, set off several small grass fires, which burned until about 1:30 p.m. in the remote area, said California Department of Forestry spokeswoman Roxanne Stager.

About 50 firefighters, as well as aircraft that made several drops of fire retardant, eventually extinguished the flames, which burned about an acre but threatened no buildings.

The helicopter involved in the accident was wrecked but not burned, Dvorak said. The craft, the only one SDG&E; leases on a long-term basis, had been scouting sites for gas-line construction, Hamrick said.

There were no power outages and the line was repaired, he said.

Dvorak said the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating.