History of Service : Copters’ Job for Police Gets Support

When 5-year-old Laura Michele Small of El Toro was mauled by a mountain lion in a remote area of Orange County a year ago, it was an Orange County Sheriff’s Department helicopter that whisked her to a Mission Viejo hospital, where doctors said the airlift possibly saved her life.

The helicopter was one of two purchased in 1985 by Sheriff-Coroner Brad Gates, who had waged a two-year campaign to persuade a reluctant Board of Supervisors to spend $1.6 million on the two aircraft and support personnel. Gates dubbed the aircraft “Duke I” and “Duke II” after the late John Wayne, who lived in Newport Beach.

There also is a grim side as evidenced by the collision of two police helicopters from Costa Mesa and Newport Beach that left three dead and two injured. Yet despite Tuesday night’s tragedy--the third fatal accident since law enforcement helicopters were introduced in Orange County in 1969--many city and county officials said Wednesday that their advantages greatly outweigh the risks.

Safety Cited

“Helicopters help keep communities safer because we found out long ago that it is far better to track suspects in high-speed chases from the air rather than on the ground,” said Irvine Mayor Larry Agran, over whose city the fatal collision occurred at 10:20 p.m.

“One of the unfortunate factors of this accident is that is just what the helicopters were doing at the time,” Agran said of the accident, which claimed the lives of two longtime Costa Mesa Police Department pilots and a civilian observer, and injured two Newport Beach police pilots.

Agran added that the Tuesday night accident over Irvine in no way diminishes his support for police use of helicopters. “This is a good use of something that modern technology has provided us,” he said.

“I think the statistics clearly show that the beneficial use of helicopters outchalk the rare incident, the tragedy, such as the one Tuesday night,” Orange County Supervisor Harriett M. Wieder said Wednesday.

In addition to the Sheriff’s Department, the cities of Huntington Beach, Costa Mesa, Anaheim and Newport Beach have police helicopters. No other Orange County police agencies use helicopters. Some cities have strongly resisted them, including Santa Ana, where Police Chief Ray Davis has objected to their cost and has sympathized with some residents who oppose them.

Davis was unavailable for comment Wednesday. But Santa Ana City Councilman John Acosta, a staunch advocate of a helicopter program for the city, said Wednesday, “I don’t think it (the crash) would affect our chances whatsoever if our chances were looking good for the program. The rest of the council still has to be convinced.”

But Acosta added that the collision during a Santa Ana police pursuit after a suspected auto thief could cause law enforcement agencies to reconsider present policies for aeriel pursuits.

“I frankly think that in a situation like this, the police will probably establish a policy that these kind of pursuits should probably be dropped. It should be for armed robberies only, or other felony crimes,” Acosta said.

Safety Not Problem

Helicopters have been controversial in Orange County since 1969, when Huntington Beach police became the first local agency to use them. But safety has rarely been a concern.

Initial complaints dealt with noise and fears of bright spotlights shining into bedroom windows, but now the issue seems to be why a particular helicopter seemed to hover over a particular neighborhood for a periods of 30 minutes or more, disrupting residents’ sleep.

Usually, the answer is that a burglar was reported to be in the vicinity and the helicopter pilot or passenger aboard the aircraft is directing a ground search, officials said.

“We were the first in Orange County,” recalled Huntington Beach Police Lt. Bob Morrison, who supervises his department’s fleet of four helicopters. “The first complaints were about noise, and invasion of privacy. But that has gone down dramatically. We have very few complaints.”

Anaheim Police Sgt. Jerry C. Foster said of his department’s two-chopper fleet: “Over 17 years of experience, people have gradually learned to accept it.”

Added Newport Beach police spokesman Kent Stoddard: “Most of the residents realize that the helicopters serve a public function, and when they orbit a (crime) scene, they do it for a reason, not because they want to.”

After Huntington Beach police began using helicopters in 1969, Costa Mesa, Anaheim and Newport Beach police quickly followed suit. Sheriff Gates, however, did not get his aircraft until 1985.

First to Fly

The Huntington Beach department was the first to fly; it also was the first to experience tragedy. In 1973, an unauthorized training flight led to the death of a police observer riding as a passenger. The helicopter hit high tension wires, flipped over and burst into flames. In 1978, during a training exercise at Long Beach Municipal Airport, the skids on another helicopter got caught on a tumbleweed firmly rooted in the tarmac. The chopper flipped over and was heavily damaged, but nobody was hurt.

The Anaheim Police Department, which has three helicopters, saw one of its pilots killed in a 1975 crash that the National Transportation Safety Board attributed to human error. The helicopter flew into Tahquitz Peak, three miles east of Idyllwild in Riverside County.

The Sheriff’s Department helicopters, Duke I and Duke II, have not been involved in any accidents in the two years since they were acquired. Costa Mesa and Newport Beach each had two helicopters before Tuesday night’s collision, which was the first helicopter accident for both departments, their spokesmen said Wednesday.

Nationally, however, use of helicopters has expanded dramatically from 61 agencies that had 118 aircraft in 1970 to about 240 with 443 helicopters last year, according to the Airborne Law Enforcement Assn. The national organization represents more than a thousand U.S. pilots working for police or public safety agencies.

The ALEA does not keep figures on accidents. In fact, the National Transportation Safety Board has complained about its lack of jurisdiction in such cases. The NTSB is only called into investigate police helicopter crashes when invited.

Ray Raffensberger, ALEA president and a Baltimore policeman, said Wednesday that the numbers of accidents are bound to increase statistically, due to the dramatic growth in the use of helicopters.

However, he pointed with pride to his own department’s safety record: five helicopters used constantly since 1970 without an accident. He said other departments have had similar safety records but could not recall them by name.

In Orange County, the 1970 Grand Jury recommended establishment of a countywide helicopter patrol to avoid having several relatively small police departments operate their own fleets.

Rejected Idea

But law enforcement officials at the time rejected the panel’s recommendation, arguing that a regional approach was unnecessary.

Supervisor Wieder, a former mayor of Huntington Beach, said Wednesday she did not think the aerial accident “would lessen support for police helicopters. They serve an important role in quick apprehension of criminals. They’re really patrol cars in the air.”

“I’ve had a personal experience showing how good and how quick they are. When I had a prowler around my house one night, the police helicopter was on the scene, shining its lights, before anyone else. It was really quick,” Wieder said.

Newport Beach City Councilman Phil Sansone said he thinks the city’s helicopters greatly benefit crime protection and therefore must be kept. “There are always complaints about the helicopters--mainly the noise--but overall I think their benefit outweighs any disadvantages. The helicopters have been of tremendous assistance to us. They’re a crime deterrent, and they’re very useful in helping surface units with high-speed chases.”

Costa Mesa Mayor Donn Hall declined to answer questions about whether the City Council would review the Police Department’s helicopter policy in light of the tragedy that took the lives of two of its most experienced pilots. “Our main concern now is for the well-being of the families,” he said. “It’s a tragedy that we’re all very concerned about.”

HELICOPTERS INVOLVED Hughes 300C helicopter--Two seat helicopter carrying Newport Beach Officers Robert Oakley, 45, and Myles Elsing, 40. Both were hospitalized. Hughes 500E helicopter--All passengers in the three-seat helicopter were killed, including Costa Mesa officers John William Libolt and James David Ketchum, both 39. The third victim was a civilian flight instructor, whose identity has not been released.