ALAMEDA, Calif. -- Six Navy personnel were killed in a crash of a giant mine-clearing helicopter in the Persian Gulf, officials said.
The MH-53E Sea Dragon crashed Saturday night shortly after takeoff from the deck of the USS Peleliu, an amphibious assault ship, officials said Monday.
The three-engine helicopter, the largest in the Western world at 73, 000 pounds, is used to clear mines, but was on a routine flight to Bahrain to deliver cargo and the Peleliu's mail when it crashed about 40 miles north of Bahrain at 9:05 p.m. local time, Virginia Felcker-Thorpe, a spokeswoman for the Alameda Naval Air Station in the San Francisco Bay Area, said.
'Although (minesweeping) is their primary mission, they were also using the helicopter to transport cargo and mail from ship and shore,' Felcker-Thorpe said.
The chopper was assigned to Mine Countermeasures Squadron 15, based at Alameda.
The bodies of those aboard were recovered and an investigation was under way Monday into the cause of the crash.
'There were several ships participating in the search' for the victims, Felcker-Thorpe said, including the nuclear-powered aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln, which is in the Gulf on its first Western Pacific patrol.
The victims were identified Monday as Lt. Thomas Larson, 30, of Oakland, Calif.; Lt. j.g. Craig Valentine, 26, of San Francisco; Petty Officer Michael Butch, 25, of Auroroa, Colo.; Petty Officer George Finneral, 21, of Lowell, Mass.; Petty Officer William Holt, 27, of Sand Springs, Okla., and Airman Jorge Guerrero, 22, of Chicago.
It was not immediately known whether Larson or Valentine was the pilot of the helicopter.
