Survivor was a passenger, to answer an earlier post.
The fact is, once the helo inverted, there was very little chance of anyone escaping. There has been much in the media about the fact that NFLD SAR was in Nova Scotia conducting training exercises at the time, and as a result, Cougar was doing their own SAR.
Those men, and at least one woman, had less than a minute to exit the chopper. Considering they may have been injured, were upside down, cold and in pitch black, that is a huge feat for anyone. They had immersion suits yes, but without an EBS, they would have had seconds.
It would have taken a minimum of 20 minutes for SAR to reach the site from St. John's--that would have been too late for these souls. To say that St. john's based SAR would have made a difference is a fallacy. As it is, there have been aircraft searching the area in rather difficult conditions. I am very frustrated with the criticism in the MSM.
To date, the names of the deceased have not been released. One of the pilots was a former military (Sea King) pilot.
Rest in peace.