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The person who crashed a Nautilus Aviation helicopter into the roof of a Cairns hotel on Monday morning was a Nautilus employee, the company has confirmed.
In a statement, Nautilus chief executive Aaron Finn said the pilot was a member of its ground crew who had worked with the company for four months prior to the incident and held a New Zealand pilot’s licence but was “not authorised” to fly its helicopters and had never flown in Australia.
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The helicopter collided with the roof of the DoubleTree Hotel on the Cairns Esplanade in the early hours of Monday morning, killing the pilot, but not seriously injuring anyone on the ground. Around 300-400 people were evacuated from the hotel.
Finn said the employee had “gained unauthorised access” to the helicopter hangar and “misappropriated” one of the Robinson R44 aircraft, hours after a party had been held among staff to celebrate his promotion.
“This was a privately organised send-off for the individual involved in Monday morning’s incident, who was recently promoted to a ground crew position at another one of our bases. This was not a work event and had been coordinated by friends,” he said.
Nautilus said it has worked with investigators on the incident.
“Nautilus Aviation have completed interviews with the Australian Transport Safety Bureau (ATSB) and QPS and have cooperated with full transparency and disclosure of all events leading up to and following the incident on Monday morning,” the company said.
“We offer our heartfelt condolences to the individual’s family and all who have been affected by this tragedy and continue to offer our support to our employees during this very challenging period.”
The Cairns Post has reported that Leichhardt MP Warren Entsch, who represents Cairns, had been briefed on CCTV footage showing a single person entering the hangar where the helicopter was stored shortly before it took off.
“It was not made clear to me how the individual gained access into the hangar, but the chopper was inside the hangar,” said Entsch.
“Once inside, I’m advised the individual used a trolley jack to move the aircraft outside, and subsequently took off.”
The ATSB is investigating the incident alongside Queensland Police and other authorities, with ATSB chief commissioner Angus Mitchell describing it as “miraculous” that nobody aside from the pilot was seriously hurt or killed, considering the speed the helicopter was believed to be going.
“Our job now is to try and really unpick that sequence of events. How was it accessed? We know the flight plan or the flight time was only very short. It was only in a matter of, sort of four or five minutes. There’s still a lot we don’t know yet, but it could have been a lot worse,” he said on ABC Radio National.
“We’re there primarily to have a look at what was the sequence of events in the helicopter, as much information as we can around those final phases, and particularly that final impact into the building, and potentially what caused that, whether it’s anything beyond an individual action.
“More broadly on an investigation like this … whether it’s regulatory on the airport security side, or it’s a police matter … they’re things that the ATSB doesn’t get involved in. We’re more interested in the actual flight itself.”
Nautilus Aviation has been contacted for comment.
