Rescuer held hand
as crash victim diedBad weather kept the woman
from getting from the helicopter
to the Kauai hospital
When rescue worker Tim Stokesbary reached the site where a tour helicopter crashed Wednesday, he assumed everyone was already dead.
Stokesbary arrived at the scene at about noon, about three hours after the Jack Harter Helicopters Bell 205 Jet Ranger crashed into the side of Mount Waialeale at about the 4,600-foot level with five people on board.
Stokesbary found the helicopter split in half with the cabin separated from the tail. He tried to secure the main cabin with ropes to keep it from sliding further down the mountain. Then he heard a voice calling for help.
Stokesbary saw a foot sticking out of the wreckage and started lifting debris. He found Monica Peterson, badly injured, pinned between a rock and part of the helicopter.
"She looked really hurt and I was shocked she was still alive," said Stokesbary, who stayed by her side for the next two hours until she died.
Meanwhile, recovery efforts were expected to resume today, weather permitting. The first pieces of wreckage from the tour helicopter crash were recovered yesterday from the crash site.
The items, which included the aircraft's undercarriage and skid assembly, tail cone and rudder, as well as personal effects, documents and charts, were lifted out of the area by helicopter, National Transportation Safety Board lead investigator Wayne Pollack said.
Stokesbary said the woman mostly asked for help on Wednesday and knew that she was the only survivor. Stokesbary ripped upholstery out of the helicopter to wrap around her and make her warm.
Fire Battalion Chief Robert Kaden said, "For the helicopter and the rescuers it was extremely dangerous. The problem was the clouds would move in quickly and completely shut down visibility in seconds."
Kaden said the rescue effort was tough on the crew at the crash site.
"They wanted so badly to move her off the mountain to get her to help, but the weather wasn't cooperating. So they couldn't do that for her and they attach the blame and responsibility for the whole accident to themselves."
Stokesbary said that when he got to Peterson, "She knew she was in bad shape and I kept telling her that she was tough and she could hold on. She was tough. Very tough."
He said "She could hear the radio and everyone talking. She kept saying she wanted to go home."
He splinted her legs, gave her oxygen and talked to her as they waited for the clouds to clear.
"I kept praying for a window of sunlight so we could put her in the basket and just get her out," said Stokesbary.
"The helicopter pilot was working really hard to get near, but the weather was impossible,'' he said.
For one glinting golden moment, they thought the helicopter had a chance to land as the clouds parted. They quickly pulled her out of the wreck and strapped her into the rescue basket.
Then the clouds closed in again.
"She was holding my hand, but I could feel her grip loosening. I finally had to radio that we had lost her.''
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Couple died in Kauai
crash celebrating
25th anniversary
He was a scientist with a wicked sense of humor and she was a middle school teacher. They had been married for 25 years and envious friends said they still held hands and looked at each other "with that glow in their eyes."
E. James Wadiak, 55, and his wife Teresa, 53, of Manassas, Va., had two adored daughters and four grandchildren.
They were celebrating their 25th wedding anniversary this week with a trip to Kauai that included a helicopter tour of the spectacular waterfalls on Mount Waialeale, one of the rainiest places on earth.
The Virginia couple died together Wednesday morning when their tour helicopter slammed into the mountain about 4,500 feet from the base. The pilot, Mark Lundgren, 44, and a young Colorado couple, Monica and Jeffrey Peterson, both 33, were also killed.
The Petersons, who lived in Denver, were celebrating their second wedding anniversary.
Monica and Jeffrey Peterson were married in Estes Park, Colo., in June 2001.
"This is tremendously heartbreaking for all of us who knew them," said Gilbert Egle, the Petersons' friend and business attorney yesterday morning. "They were two wonderful people who will be missed."
Pilot Lundgren, 44, of Puhi was a former Navy pilot who had flown tours for Jack Harter Helicopters for years. He had a wife and three grown children.
Elaine Eiginger, a longtime friend of the Wadiaks, said, "Jim and Tess were such a loving couple. They were the ultimate couple. After 25 years, they were still so much in love. I should be so lucky to be that in love after all those years. They were really the perfect pair and I'm going to miss them dearly."
Eiginger said she spoke to Wadiak by telephone Wednesday just as they were leaving for the helicopter tour, the same tour Eiginger had taken and loved five years ago.
"They had been having a wonderful time. The island was gorgeous and they were relaxing and enjoying being with each other,'' said Eiginger who has worked with Wadiak for 15 years and watched his children and small grandchildren grow.
"He was this wonderfully spunky guy who lived life to the fullest,'' said Eiginger, trying to find the words to sum up a dear friend in a few economic phrases. "He would take off on the spur of the moment to do things. Like take his grandchildren skiing up north or to the World Series. Family was so important to him."
Wadiak was also the chief operating officer of Transmitter Location Systems LLC, a satellite tracking company. His wife taught English in the public schools of Fairfax County, Virginia.
Jeffrey Peterson owned Colorado Paint Works Inc., a high-end residential and commercial painting company, said Egle. Monica Peterson designed women's clothing, wedding dresses and handbags. According to an October article in The Denver Post, she also taught fashion design at the Colorado Institute of Art and was an interior designer.
Friends of the Petersons declined to comment yesterday on the couple in deference to wishes of the couple's families.
