Helicopter crashes: Pilot escapes as copter burns in Coos Bay cemetery
MILLINGTON - Employees of Sunset Memorial Park heard a terrible noise coming from the sky Thursday.
Luckily, pilot Mike Garner knew what to do when his helicopter struggled to the ground from 1,000 feet and crashed into the cemetery, where it immediately burst into flames and was reduced to ashes and a gnarled metal frame. Using his helmet, Garner broke out the side window immediately after impact and walked away from the scene with only minor cuts and burns.
The crash was caused by a mechanical failure in the Rotorway 162-F chopper that Garner built himself, he said.
"The RPM meter was floating up and down," Garner said. "At 60 mph, I turned, exactly as I was trained, into the wind and pulled a full collective. I did that and hoped to hit a soft spot."
Sunset maintenance worker John Kaiser was first to contact the pilot. "I thought I was going to pull out a bloody body," Kaiser said. "He didn't get hurt too bad, considering, and I'm sure glad he's alive."
Garner concurred. "He asked me if I was hurt and I said 'No, now let's get away from this thing,'" Garner said.
Chemical smoke rose among the headstones after the Millington Fire District put out the small blaze in under one minute shortly after 12:30 p.m., Fire Chief Drew Solomon said.
The retired commercial pilot said he took off from Norway at a field informally known as "Crazy Dave's" and landed at North Bend Municipal Airport so he could have lunch with his friend, Jim Paterson. The crash occurred as Garner was making his way back to the valley.
He landed mere feet from the grave site of his father-in-law, Jim McKinley.
"I thought to myself, well, my father-in-law is buried over there, I don't want to hit him," Garner said.
Garner ultimately made a relatively soft landing, he said, and no gravestones were damaged.
"I usually fly at 500 feet, but I'm glad I wasn't. That wouldn't give me enough time," he said.
Garner also was involved in a similar crash in a gyro helicopter over Bandon in the 1990s.
"This is the second one," he said, adding he doesn't fear death. "All the co-pilots used to tell me I'd used up all my luck."
He added: "I've got 20,000 flying hours, but only 115 in helicopters."
Garner said he tried to maneuver to the other side of Isthmus Slough but came up short and picked the flattest spot in the cemetery. "I was surprised I was OK," Garner said, adding the helicopter's fuel tank is directly behind the pilot seat.
He attributes his being alive to a helmet that his wife, Margaret, gave him for Christmas two years ago.
"She made me promise to always wear it," Garner said.
He held that and a partially melted nylon jacket for witnesses to see.
Federal Aviation Administra-tion officials from Portland investigated the crash Thursday. According to Mike O'Connor, regional duty officer for the FAA office in Renton, Wash., investigators with the National Transportation Safety Board have not determined a cause of the crash and the information could take months to be determined.
Along with Millington firefighters, personnel from the North Bend Fire Department and Coos County Sheriff's Office deputies also responded to the scene.
As he cleaned his wounds in the memorial park offices, Garner said he would haul away the destroyed craft himself.
Asked if he owns other helicopters, he responded quickly.
"I wish."