A Hamilton-based rescue helicopter has crashed on its way to save a patient this afternoon.<\/p>\n
The Philips Search and Rescue Trust said in a statement the helicopter had been en route to a patient on Mt Pirongia, a popular hiking and recreational area in the Waikato, when “an incident occurred that resulted in a heavy landing”.<\/p>\n
“Thankfully, there are no injuries to report.”<\/p>\n
Two other aircraft were dispatched to the scene to assist.<\/p>\n
“Their primary mission was to locate and extract both the patient and the helicopter’s crew in a safe and efficient manner. The swift response ensured that those involved in the incident were helped promptly and without any reported injuries,” Philips Search and Rescue Trust said.<\/p>\n
The Civil Aviation Authority confirmed the helicopter crashed and the accident had been reported to the Transport Accident Investigation Commission (TAIC).<\/p>\n
“Tomorrow our investigators will continue working with Police and the operator to gather information about exactly what happened and why,” the CAA said in a statement.<\/p>\n
The Auckland Westpac Rescue Helicopter winched three men from the scene and took them to Waikato Hospital in a minor condition.<\/p>\n
The Taranaki Rescue Helicopter winched patients out as well.<\/p>\n
ONE NEWS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A Hamilton-based rescue helicopter has crashed on its way to save a patient this afternoon. The Philips Search and Rescue Trust said in a statement the helicopter had been en route to a patient on Mt Pirongia, a popular hiking and recreational area in the Waikato, when “an incident occurred that resulted in a heavy […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":7923,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222,174],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news","category-nz-news"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7922"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7924,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7922\/revisions\/7924"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}