On Friday the Coast Guard located wreckage of an air tour helicopter that went missing on the Hawaiian island of Kauai Thursday afternoon. All seven aboard the Safari Helicopters Airbus AS350B2 were killed, including Safari’s chief pilot, Paul Matero, 69. Matero held a commercial rotorcraft rating issued in 2011 and a second-class FAA physical with limitations for corrective lenses. He was scheduled to retire in early 2020. The six passengers were described as two separate families, one from Switzerland and the other from Wisconsin that included a 47-year-old woman and her 13-year-old daughter.
The helicopter was flying over the northwest side of the island when it made its last position report at 4:40 p.m. Thursday shortly after leaving the Waimea Canyon area. The wreckage was located northwest of that area in the Kokee State Park, approximately 1.3 miles from the coast. Local officials said it the helicopter appeared to have struck a cliff and then dropped up to 300 feet to the terrain below in a remote and rugged area between the Milolli Ridge Road and the Nualolo Trail, 13 miles north of Hanapepe.
Kokee is a large plateau that encompasses 4,345 acres with elevations from 3,200 to 4,200 msl. The area is notorious for late afternoon fog.