Witness Lionel Douglass, who was attending a wedding on a bluff about 1,000 yards away from where the helicopter crashed and exploded. Douglass told ABC News that he saw the helicopter plummet from the sky after doing two complete circles as if the pilot was searching for a spot to set the aircraft down.
"It happened so fast. When I saw them turning, I wasn't sure what he was doing and by the time I yelled to everybody to turn around and look, it was all out of control," Douglass said. "It fell down between the mountains, the tail broke in half, it hit the bottom and it was the biggest explosion you ever heard and then flames like you never seen before."
He said the initial explosion was followed by five or six others.