Israel's Air Force Launches Probe To Determine Cause Of Helicopter Crash That Killed Pilots

By JPost
Posted on 01/04/22 | News Source: JPost

The Israeli military has begun to investigate the circumstances surrounding the deadly crash of a Navy helicopter that crashed off the coast of Haifa on Monday night.

Two IDF pilots died after their helicopter- an Atalef AS565 Panther - went down around 9 PM.

The main direction of the investigation is that a technical malfunction caused the helicopter to crash into the sea. Throughout the night and during the day, crews worked to recover all parts of the helicopter in order to ascertain the reason for the crash. The Air Force will also try to reconstruct all the pilot’s actions during the flight and see if there had been any human error involved in the tragedy.

The two fatalities were identified as 38-year-old Lt.-Col Erez Sachaini, who was married with three children and who served as deputy commander of Ramat David airbase, and 27-year-old Major Hen Fogel.

The third crew member was rescued shortly after the crash from the sea and flown to Rambam Hospital in moderate condition. The military is hoping that he may be able to shed light on what happened in the helicopter before it went down.

Israel Air Force chief of operations Brig.-Gen. Amir Lazar said that the Sachaini and Fogel were recovered from the cockpit of the helicopter after it sank beneath the waves in a “complex” recovery operation.

According to Lazar, who spoke to reporters following the crash, the helicopter went down without sending an emergency distress call.

“No call was heard on the radio before the accident. It disappeared from the monitoring screen and then there was a report of a helicopter that hit the water and we activated rescue forces,” he said.