NEW YORK — A family from Spain was about to celebrate the ninth birthday of one of their children when their sightseeing helicopter broke apart in midair and crashed into the Hudson River between New York City and New Jersey, killing all six people aboard in the latest U.S. aviation disaster, officials said Friday.
Authorities including the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating Thursday’s mid-afternoon crash. There has been no word of a cause. The NTSB plans to brief reporters Friday.
The victims included Siemens executive Agustin Escobar, his wife, Mercè Camprubí Montal, a global manager at an energy technology company, and three children, in addition to the pilot, a person briefed on the investigation told The Associated Press. The person could not discuss details of the investigation publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. The pilot also died.
New York City Mayor Eric Adams said the children were 4, 8 and 10 years old, and the 8-year-old’s birthday was Friday.
“So this is probably part of the normal tourist attraction of seeing the city from the skyline,” Adams told Fox 5 New York. “But it’s just a real unfortunate situation. And our heart goes out to the family members.”
Escobar was in the New York area on business and his family flew over to meet him for a few days, said Steven Fulop, mayor of Jersey City, New Jersey, in a post on X. He said a relative was expected to arrive Friday and officials were working with the medical examiner to release the bodies to be taken back to Spain.
Fulop said divers would resume the search for major parts of the helicopter Friday. Pieces could be seen floating in the river Friday morning.
Photos on the helicopter company’s website show the couple and their children smiling as they boarded just before taking off.
The flight departed a downtown heliport around 3 p.m. and lasted less than 18 minutes. Radar data shows it flew north along the Manhattan skyline then south toward the Statue of Liberty.
Video of the crash showed parts of the aircraft tumbling through the air into the water near the shoreline of Jersey City, New Jersey.
Witnesses describe the helicopter’s plunge into the Hudson
Bruce Wall, in Jersey City, said he saw the helicopter “falling apart” midair. The tail and the main rotor broke away, and the rotor continued to spin as it descended to the water.
Dani Horbiak was in her Jersey City home when she heard what sounded like “several gunshots in a row.” She looked out her window and saw the chopper “splash in several pieces into the river.”
The helicopter was spinning uncontrollably with “a bunch of smoke coming out” before it slammed into the water, said Lesly Camacho, a hostess at a restaurant along the river in Hoboken, New Jersey.
Rescue boats circled the submerged aircraft within minutes of impact near the end of a long maintenance pier for a ventilation tower serving the Holland Tunnel. Recovery crews hoisted the mangled helicopter out of the water just after 8 p.m. using a floating crane.
The bodies were also recovered from the river, Adams said.
The flight was operated by New York Helicopter. No one answered the phones at the company’s offices in New York and New Jersey on Thursday or Friday.
A person who answered the phone at the home of the company’s owner, Michael Roth, said he declined to comment. Roth told the New York Post he was devastated and had “no clue” what happened.
“The only thing I know by watching a video of the helicopter falling down, that the main rotor blades weren’t on the helicopter,” the Post quoted him as saying. He added that he had not seen such a thing happen during his 30 years in the helicopter business, but noted: “These are machines, and they break.”
Emails seeking comment were sent to attorneys who have represented Roth in the past.
The Federal Aviation Administration identified the helicopter as a Bell 206, a model widely used in commercial and government aviation, including by sightseeing companies, TV news stations and police. It was initially developed for the U.S. Army and thousands have been manufactured over the years.
Tragedy strikes a family from Spain
Escobar worked for the tech company Siemens for more than 27 years, most recently as global CEO for rail infrastructure at Siemens Mobility, according to his LinkedIn account. In late 2022, he briefly became president and CEO of Siemens Spain. In a post about the position, he thanked his family: “my endless source of energy and happiness, for their unconditional support, love … and patience.”
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Escobar regularly posted about the importance of sustainability in the rail industry and often traveled for work, including to India and the United Kingdom in the past month. He also was vice president of the German Chamber of Commerce for Spain since 2023.
“We are deeply saddened by the tragic helicopter crash in which Agustin Escobar and his family lost their lives. Our heartfelt condolences go out to all their loved ones,” Siemens said in a statement early Friday.
Camprubí Montal worked in Barcelona, Spain, for energy technology company Siemens Energy for about seven years, including as its global commercialization manager and as a digitalization manager, according to her LinkedIn account.
Spanish government officials said the family lived in Barcelona.
“The news that has reached us about a helicopter accident in the Hudson River IS devastating,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said on X. “Five members of a Spanish family, including three children, have lost their lives. It is a unimaginable tragedy. I feel for the loss of their loved ones.”
Barcelona-based newspaper El Periódico reported that the three children attended school in the upscale neighborhood of Sarria. The school said in a statement on Instagram that it is “devastated by the death of a family of our community” but declined to comment to The Associated Press.
The Catalan regional president, Salvador Illa, wrote on X that he was dismayed by news of the crash.
What may have caused the crash?
Videos of the crash suggest a “catastrophic mechanical failure” left the pilot with no chance to save the helicopter, said Justin Green, an aviation lawyer who was a helicopter pilot in the Marine Corps. It is possible the helicopter’s main rotors struck the tail boom, breaking it apart and causing the cabin to free fall, Green said.
“No pilot could have prevented that accident once they lost the lifts,” Green said. “It’s like a rock falling to the ground. It’s heartbreaking.”
The skies over Manhattan are routinely filled with planes and helicopters, both private recreational aircraft and commercial and tourist flights. Manhattan has several helipads from which business executives and others are whisked to destinations throughout the metropolitan area.
At least 38 people have died in helicopter accidents in New York City since 1977. A collision between a plane and a tourist helicopter over the Hudson in 2009 killed nine people, and five died in 2018 when a charter helicopter offering “open door” flights went down into the East River.
New York Helicopter also owned a Bell 206 that lost power and made an emergency landing on the Hudson during a sightseeing tour in June 2013. The pilot managed to land safely and he and the passengers — a family of four Swedes — were uninjured. The National Transportation Safety Board found that a maintenance flub and an engine lubrication anomaly led to the power cutoff.
Thursday’s crash was the first for a helicopter in the city since one hit the roof of a skyscraper in 2019, killing the pilot.
The accidents and the noise caused by helicopters have repeatedly led community activists and officials to propose banning or restricting traffic at Manhattan heliports.
Other recent crashes and close calls have led to worries about the safety of flying in the U.S. Seven people were killed when a medical transport plane plummeted into a Philadelphia neighborhood in January. That happened two days after an American Airlines jet and an Army helicopter collided in midair in Washington in the deadliest U.S. air disaster in a generation.