SANTA ROSA BEACH, Fla. (AP) -- Divers recovered the body of a third and final helicopter ambulance crew member Thursday from Choctawhatchee Bay where the aircraft crashed.
Sheriff's divers from neighboring Okaloosa County located the body of Robert Heighton, a Gulf Breeze paramedic employed by the South Walton Fire District, shortly before noon near this Walton County community.
Also kill in the crash early Wednesday were Tom Palcic, 63, the AIRHeart helicopter's pilot from Fort Walton Beach, and flight nurse Jack Chase, 47, of Santa Rosa Beach, Sacred Heart Health Systems officials said. Their bodies were found Wednesday. No patients were aboard.
Palcic had flown helicopters for 27 years. He worked for Metro Aviation Inc. of Shreveport, La., which maintains and flies two helicopters for Sacred Heart, one based at Santa Rosa Beach and the other at Marianna. Chase worked for Sacred Heart, which has hospitals in Pensacola and Santa Rosa Beach.
No one knew the helicopter had gone down until about five hours after crew members radioed emergency dispatchers to report that bad weather had forced them to turn back minutes after taking off from the AIRHeart hangar in Santa Rosa Beach. Thunderstorms were reported Wednesday in the Florida Panhandle.
The helicopter had been headed for DeFuniak Springs, about 25 miles north of here, to fly a critically ill heart patient to a Pensacola hospital. A ground ambulance made the transfer after the helicopter aborted its flight.
Dispatchers violated procedure by failing to make sure the Eurocopter BO-105 had returned safely, said Ed Baltzley, director of the Walton County Emergency Operations Center.
Crews are supposed to check with dispatch when they land. If they fail to so after 20 minutes, dispatchers are supposed to contact them, he said.
Even if the helicopter had been reported missing immediately, the crew probably would have died because of the severity of their injuries, said Walton sheriff's Capt. Stan Sunday.
No one noticed the helicopter missing until a relief crew arrived about 6 a.m. CDT and found the hangar empty.
The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating. The wreckage was removed from the bay Thursday and taken to a warehouse in Destin, said Walton sheriff's spokesman Dennis Wise.
