A police report on the air crash in Whyanbeel Valley (via Mossman) stated that police and emergency services were called to the scene of a helicopter crash yesterday afternoon.

A Cairns based helicopter was undertaking charter work in the Whyanbeel Valley area north of Mossman when crashed into a creek bed at around 4.30pm.

Three male passengers managed to escape relatively unscathed and were able to walk to seek assistance.  The pilot sustained injuries in the crash and was airlifted to Cairns Hospital for treatment.

Newsport spoke to neighbouring property owners today about the incident and what they saw yesterday afternoon and their concerns over yet another helicopter incident.

Alan Carle a resident of the neighbouring property of the crash site was approached by one of the males immediately after the air crash to call for emergency assistance.

“I didn’t hear a thing, it was only that one of the men from the air crash came to my property to call for help that I knew what had happened,” said Mr Carle.

Due to the location of the crash site, emergency services had to be escorted by Mr Carle and another neighbour Can Cara.

“It happened about 600 metres from my property on a neighbouring property in the bush,” said Mr Cara.

The crash site was not accessible by normal vehicle due to creek crossings and was covered in Guinea Grass which hid the helicopter from view.  The helicopter landed into a fenced area that both Mr Cara and Mr Carle assisted in removing the fencing for accesses for emergency services. Mr Cara was able to drive the ambulance officers to the scene.

“I waited for the emergency services to arrive and then the ambulance officer loaded stuff into my vehicle and I drove the ambulance officer to the scene with one of the men from the helicopter. It was my decision to guide the ambulance officers because that’s where you can lose time.

“Another GBR helicopter landed near the crash site to give the emergency services helicopter the GPS co-ordinates to locate the site,” said Mr Cara.

Mossman police guarded the crash scene overnight and will remain until the arrival of Air Safety investigators today.

Cairns Hospital confirmed this afternoon that a 41 year old male was still in a stable condition.  Also three males aged 30, 31 and 48 years old were transferred to Mossman Hospital after the incident and were all discharged yesterday evening.

The property owners are concerned about the helicopters that hover so close to the tree canopy’s for weed surveying, as there have been other helicopter incidences over the years.

“Since the helicopter incident four years ago I am always worried about the weed team surveying this area.  There must be other technologies to do the job.  This time they were all very lucky,” said Mr Cara.