ABC News Update
Investigators from the Australian Transport Safety Bureau are to interview witnesses to the Victorian rescue accident on Saturday in which a 68-year-old man died.
The man from Sydney fell 30 metres to his death as he was being winched aboard an Ambulance Victoria helicopter after breaking his ankle while hunting.
He was being airlifted from a remote area known as Macs Cove at Lake Eildon, near Mansfield north-east of Melbourne.
The ATSB's Greg Madden says a team of four investigators will interview witnesses.
"The four investigators are in Melbourne conducting interviews, examining the helicopter and the winching equipment and also looking at maintenance records and we're also intending to interview witnesses in the coming days," he said.
"Once we've reviewed and analysed the information, if there are safety lessons that become apparent, we'll certainly advise the regulator along with the industry, the operators in the industry including the helicopter operators that have similar equipment."
He expects a preliminary report to be prepared within a month.
Ambulance Victoria has given the all clear to using some of its helicopter winches after the accident.
All winching operations were suspended immediately after the accident, but the service's chief executive, Greg Sassella, says engineers have confirmed the safety of winches on three of its five helicopters.
"We like to make sure that we check the equipment all the way down to every connector, every strap we use, the winching machine, everything that is mechanical and we've gone through that, or the engineers have gone through that," he said.
Ambulance Victoria says both the winch and the helicopter were more than capable of lifting the patient and the paramedic.
That is a view echoed by Steve McGhie of the Ambulance Employees Association.
He says the man's weight would definitely be an issue in the investigation in terms of the helicopter's capabilities and the distance it had to fly to hospital.
"It's certainly something that has to be taken into consideration," he said.
"I daresay it will be one of the factors in the investigation."
He says the issue is whether or not the equipment fitted correctly and that is relevant whether the person is large or small.