All nine crew confirmed dead after gov’t helicopter crashes in Japan

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TOKYO, Aug. 11, 2018 (BSS/XINHUA) – All nine crew members aboard a local
Japanese government helicopter that crashed on a mountain in the prefecture
of Gunma on Friday have been confirmed dead, police said on Saturday.

Two of the crew members were declared dead on Friday, and seven more were
confirmed dead Saturday after a rescue mission by some 160 police officials
and Self-Defense Force personnel was conducted in the morning.

According to the authorities, the chopper was one of the prefecture’s
disaster prevention helicopters and lost contact with air traffic controllers
shortly past 10 a.m. local time after taking off at 9:15 a.m. local time on
Friday.

The helicopter was being flown by Noriyuki Amagai, 57, an experienced
pilot who had logged many flying hours, sources close to the matter said.

The chopper was scheduled to return to its heliport in Maebashi City,
Gunma Prefecture, at 10:45 a.m. local time Friday, prefectural officials
said.

The helicopter was supposed to be observing a hiking trail, which spans
Gunma, Nagano and Niigata prefectures when contact was lost, officials said.

The transport ministry said the helicopter was a Bell 412EP helicopter and
had began operations in May 1997, clocking up around 7,000 flight hours.

The same model of helicopter crashed in March last year killing all nine
occupants and in November last year another crash involving the same model
crashed killing four people aboard.

The ministry’s Transport Safety Board has sent three officials to the site
to investigate the cause of the incident.