Three
Canadian men who were in a plane that crashed into the upper slopes of
one of Antarctica's highest mountains have officially been pronounced
dead by a New Zealand coroner.
Pilot
Bob Heath, 55, first officer Mike Denton, 25, and engineer Perry
Anderson, 36, were aboard the Twin Otter aircraft which smashed into the
4480-metre Mt Elizabeth, which is part of New Zealand's international
territory, on January 23 this year.
They were traveling from the South Pole Station to Terra Nova Bay, where they were to assist an Italian research team.
Due to the extreme weather conditions and high altitude their bodies have never been recovered.
An inquest into their deaths was held before New Zealand's Chief Coroner Judge Neil MacLean in Auckland District Court today.
The
hearing was live-streamed to the men's families in Canada as Judge
MacLean determined they died of multiple injuries resulting from a
high-speed crash into the side of the mountain.
The
officer in charge of the search and rescue effort, Senior Sergeant
Bruce Johnston, told the inquest searchers were not able to even see the
site of the crash for several days due to poor weather before a
Hercules plane spotted it.
"It
was steeply angled into the snow. The cockpit was not visible and
appeared to be deeply embedded in the snow. There were no signs of life
in the aircraft," Mr Johnston said.
"It was obvious due to the nature of the impact into the mountain that the crash would not have been survivable."
On
January 27, the weather improved sufficiently for a search and rescue
team to be positioned on a ridge above the crash site and make its way
down.
The
searchers recovered some of the men's personal belongings, including Mr
Heath's wallet and driver's license, Mr Anderson's passport and Mr
Denton's bag containing an airline ticket and a book with his name
written in it.
Judge MacLean said it would be "extraordinarily difficult", if not impossible, to recover the bodies from the mountain.
He praised the efforts off the search and rescuers involved.
"It
is clear that the recovery efforts were very dangerous - the personnel
involved were at high altitude in extreme conditions," Judge MacLean
said.
"I don't think it's putting it too highly to say they showed great personal courage to try and recover those bodies."
He said he had sufficient evidence before him to determine how the men died.
"In
a very harsh and unforgiving environment an experienced pilot well used
to the conditions in an apparently well maintained plane ... came to
grief by impacting on the upper slopes on Mt Elizabeth in Antarctica.
"Without
the benefit of a post-mortem the only thing that can be said about the
cause of death is it is likely to be multiple injuries sustained when
the aircraft slammed at speed into the slopes of Mt Elizabeth."
Judge MacLean extended his condolences to the men's families.
Source: http://www.nzherald.co.nz