Ferry chopper ditches in Atlantic with 18 on board

[Burak Gazan]

CTV.ca News Staff

A helicopter has ditched in the North Atlantic off of Newfoundland, with 18 people on board.

The chopper went down about 90 kilometres southeast of St. John's, said Jeri Grychowski of the Joint Rescue Co-ordination Centre in Halifax.

She told CTV Newsnet that the chopper was carrying offshore oil workers when it ditched at about 9:18 local time Thursday.

"We currently have a number of both air and sea vessels in the area," she said.

"A provincial airline is providing top cover and they initially reported sighting two people in the water and a life raft as well, though at this time we have no indication of how many, or if any, people are in the life raft."

Grychowski said she believes the chopper was heading from Hibernia's platform to St. John's when it ditched.

However, later reports said Hibernia was referring calls to Husky, which operates the White Rose offshore oil facility.

Air traffic controllers in Gander, N.L. received a mayday radio call Thusday morning , and a rescue effort was scrambled immediately.

A supply ship from St. John's was first on the scene. Four Cormorant helicopters and a Hercules aircraft are en route, along with a Coast Guard ship, Grychowski said.

The ditched helicopter is operated by Cougar Helicopters in St. John's.

NTV reports that journalists are being kept away from the company's headquarters, and police have even blocked off the road leading to Cougar's offices.

Another Cougar helicopter is also now on location, Grychowski said.

Waves are between two and three metres in the area, and winds are roughly 37 kilometres per hour, Grychowski said.

A news conference has been scheduled for 1 p.m. local time.

The emergency room at a St. John's hospital is bracing for a possible influx of patients, according to reports.

From CTV News

[Edi]

If they haven't found anyone alive by now, they won't either. The sea is too cold and unforgiving under those conditions this time of the year. They'll be lucky if they find the chopper itself from the bottom.

[Burak Gazan]

Latest update says they have got one, who was alive when taken from rescue chopper but condition unknown. But you right there, if they not in a raft or pulled out, they be a block of ice by now, survival suit or no.

[Broomstick]

CNN is reporting that in additional to the airlifted survivor, two others and a life raft have been spotted. So there might be more than one survivor.

[Burak Gazan]

16 MIA, one confirmed dead, one survivor at last update.

[TithonusSyndrome]

Miserable little island. The locals all swear by it and consider it the most beautiful place on earth, but it's claimed the lives of more explorers and seamen than I can count. This doesn't do much to revise my impression of it as an unforgiving and desolate place far from civilization.