COURTESY OF WALTER AND HELEN SUMINSKI
The pilot ditched this homemade Cozy Long EZ aircraft in the ocean north of Maui Saturday on a flight to California.
Rescue crews
pluck pilot from
dark seas off Maui
A former Coast Guard helicopter pilot was rescued early yesterday after his homemade plane crashed about 94 miles northeast of Maui.
Lt. Cmdr. William Swears, 43, formerly stationed at Barbers Point Coast Guard Air Station, was in guarded condition yesterday at Maui Memorial Hospital after surviving 3 1/2 hours in the ocean without a life preserver.
Swears, of Mililani, was cut and badly bruised, nearly hypothermic and suffering from shock but coherent, said friend and fellow Coast Guard pilot Lt. Clint Trocchio, who flew the C-130 plane that spotted Swears' strobe light.
A commercial aircraft relayed the initial distress report shortly before 9 p.m. Saturday, which was passed on to the Coast Guard.
"I knew immediately (it was Swears)," Trocchio said. "We had lunch together earlier in the day. I knew his flight plan. I knew the type of aircraft."
Federal Aviation Administration spokesman Allen Kenitzer said Swears was flying a Cozy Long EZ, tail number N534S, from Honolulu to Novato, Calif., when he reported engine trouble and loss of oil pressure.
Swears was turning around and heading back to Honolulu when he ditched the plane, Kenitzer said.
The plane, which has a range of about 2,000 miles, was equipped with an emergency locating transmitter.
Two Hawaii Air National Guard F-15E Strike Eagle jets arrived first on scene, and their crews, using night-vision goggles, reported seeing an oil slick but nothing else.
Trocchio said the fighter jets and his C-130 homed in on the transmitter's location.
"We descended down to a low level, 500 feet, and we saw a white object in the water -- a strobe light," Trocchio said.
An HH-65 Dolphin helicopter -- the same kind Swears had piloted on search and rescue missions -- arrived about 12:27 a.m. and "found something flapping in the water, and it turned out that that flapping and waving was the pilot," Trocchio said.
Swears was hoisted into the helicopter in a basket and taken to Maui Memorial Hospital.
Coast Guard spokeswoman Petty Officer Jennifer Johnson said Swears survived "because his survival equipment was very, very good."
Besides the transmitter and strobe light, he was also carrying a satellite phone, she said.
Swears had a retirement ceremony from the Coast Guard a few weeks ago and planned to move to Alaska with his wife and young daughter. In preparation he was taking his plane to the mainland, Trocchio said. Swears is on leave until his official retirement in February.
Walter and Helen Suminski, of Michigan, built the plane and sold it to Swears three years ago.
"It's a very stable plane, and he was very good in it," said Helen Suminski, who piloted the plane with her husband. "He learned real fast. He's a good learner. He's done a lot of saving lives in a helicopter."
The couple worked daily for three years to build the plane and purchased the engine separately.
"It was like raising a child almost," she said, and had regretted selling the plane.
Kenitzer said the FAA will investigate the cause of the crash, reviewing air traffic control tapes, but noted that he was not sure if investigators would be able to retrieve parts of the aircraft.
The National Transportation Safety Board and Canard.com Web sites listed 69 accidents involving the Long EZ investigated by the NTSB from 1983 to 2002, including the fatal crash of singer John Denver in 1997.
