Helicopter assists in plane debris recovery

Activity today in rural, western Oconee—where the small plane crashed last Friday and took four lives.  Because some of the wreckage fell in a ravine, the National Transportation Safety Board has employed a heavy-lift helicopter to extract debris.  From the crash scene that debris will be trucked to Atlanta to a facility where the plan is to try to re-assemble the single-engine Piper Saratoga.  There, Ralph Hicks of the NTSB, re-assembling the plane will assist in determining why the plane crashed.  Hicks also said the presence of the Oconee coroner at the crash scene today is not unusual. “It’s not uncommon to have the coroner in place when we are recovering wreckage in case there are personal effects, thing like that, that may be recovered…,” Hicks said this morning.