As promised, here is the story of our experience from last Friday on Lake Wisconsin.
Clearance to post this was given by Sargeant Joe Welsch of the Sauk County Sheriffs department.
08/06/04 Helicopter crash on Lake Wisconsin
I spent the afternoon mapping out the area on Lake Wisconsin from above the dam to the mouth of Grubers Grove. Having just bought a new boat and arming it with the latest sonar and GPS technology toys for fisherman, I was doing my best to learn how to use it.
At 6:15pm, I picked up Nancy at the Sauk County boat landing. We then went to Grubers Grove and began trolling with crank baits for walleyes.
On the first pass, we lost a pretty good fish trolling in 15’ of water. Shortly after we put two eaters in the boat and then lost another good one.
The real story of this night took place at approximately 7:50 pm.
We had just finished turning the boat around and had a total of four lines out. The two outside lines were on planer boards. We were maybe 100 to 150 yards off shore when we heard what sounded like a low flying plane or helicopter coming from the northwest. Something about it sounded different. The noise it made wasn’t quite right. Kind of like the pilot was pushing the engines as hard as he could.
Then we could see it coming towards us. Through the trees branches on shore, we could see it was flying very low and fast, heading almost directly at us.
A couple of hundred yards from the shoreline, it started gaining some altitude. By now we could tell that it was definitely a helicopter and it was pretty much totally out of control.
Neither one of us was able distinguish and exact color. I thought maybe black and Nancy thought dark green. It was not a little helicopter either. You know the kind they give people rides in at county fairs and such. I don’t know anything about the different makes of helicopters, but it appeared large enough to carry six to eight people.
The back end was swinging one way, then the other and the operator did not appear to have the ability to keep this aircraft level. Rotating out of plane to the left then right, then back the other way again.
The whole time this was occurring, the craft was moving very fast towards us. I have no idea how fast these things can fly, but this guy was moving in our direction at a speed that quickly scared the living crap out of both my wife and I.
Just before this out of control helicopter reach the shoreline, my wife began screaming at me to GO, GO, GO!!!
My brain was scrambling now. I gave the little T8 Yamaha kicker motor everything it had but knew in the back of my mind that it was not going to move and 18’ Lund fast enough to avoid a collision if that thing started coming down at us.
At the same time, I also knew that there wasn’t anywhere near enough time to jump into the drivers seat, lower the big engine down into the water, start it and take off.
In that instant, realizing that there was not going to be any kind of quick get away on our part, the helicopter spun around 180 degrees and stop dead in the air maybe a hundred feet or so above the trees and right at the edge of the shoreline. It hung there for a split second before turning nose down and making a nearly strait path down into the ground where it exploded in a huge fireball. The flames instantly shooting up as high as the trees and a large mushroom cloud quickly appeared above it.
Nancy asked what we should do now and I yelled back 911, 911!
She turned on the cell phone and punched in 911, the line was busy. She tried two or three more times, but each time she just got a busy signal.
We knew there was a house right there but could not tell for sure if it had been hit. Trees and brush along the shore gave us an obscured view of the crash site. I thought maybe a glancing blow. And although one side of the house was completely engulfed in flames, it was still standing and looked to be in intact.
We could clearly hear crackling noise’s from the fire, and soon realized that the noise was coming from all the wood on the house. It resembled a large bon fire at this point. Nothing appeared to be left of the helicopter from our point of view in the boat.
People could occasionally be seen running across the lawn and we could here them yelling back and forth to each other. It appeared as though they may have been helping anyone inside the house get out.
Next the sirens started going off in the distance. We could hear them from several different directions up and down the lake.
Emergency personnel response time was actually pretty impressive.
Again, it was very hard to say what the actual response time was.
At this point, we were still wide eyed and not to sure if we could believe what we had just seen but yet glad that this flying bomb had not continued on toward us. We had no idea if anyone on shore, or in that house was hurt or if they had managed to get out safely. We could only hope for the best.
We pulled our lines, put everything away and watched for a short while.
Knowing that it would be dark soon, we pulled out and headed for the boat landing.
Thinking back about it now, from the time we could first hear this helicopter to the time that it went down was probably no more that 10 to 15 seconds.
What we witnessed seemed unreal and yet incredible. Even though we both were there, it was as though we still did not want to believe what we just saw. What are the odds, I wondered, of being hit by a helicopter while sitting in your living room watching TV?
We could not get those images out of our minds that night and neither one of us slept well.
The detective who took my statement informed me that this type of helicopter has the ability to fly as fast as 150 mph. I thought about that for a while. And about how much this thing probably weighed?
In the news the following day, we learned that three people were in the house at the time of the crash. They all survive, traumatized I’m sure.
Cuts and bruises were the worst physical injuries suffered.
We also learned later, that the rotor and about six to ten feet of the tail section had fallen into the bay of Grubers Grove prior to the crash.
Apparently, it hit a high power electric line that is strung across the bay and that’s what caused it to lose control and crash.
It really made Nancy and I consider just how fast everything in your life can be completely changed by something totally beyond your control.
