By IANS/EFE,
Port-au-Prince: Four crew members of a Spanish navy helicopter were killed when their aircraft crashed in a mountainous area of Haiti near the border with the Dominican Republic, authorities said.
Spain’s defense ministry said in a statement that the helicopter belonged to the navy vessel Castilla, which has been in Haiti since February on a humanitarian mission to aid victims of the Jan 12 earthquake that left more than 200,000 dead and around a million people homeless in the impoverished Caribbean nation.
The accident occurred Friday afternoon when the chopper was returning from the Dominican Republic after picking up a shipment sent from Spain.
The statement said the helicopter was accompanied on its mission by another chopper but the two aircraft lost contact due to low visibility.
In an ensuing search, the helicopter was found to have crashed into a mountainside in a area near the Haitian town of Fonds-Verrettes.
Spanish Defense Minister Carme Chacon is scheduled to travel Saturday to Haiti to gather information about the crash and speed up efforts to repatriate the bodies.