Helicopter Crash on Great Barrier Reef Kills 2 U.S. Tourists

SYDNEY — Two U.S. tourists were killed Wednesday when their helicopter crashed near a coral-viewing site on the Great Barrier Reef off northeastern Australia, authorities said.

The helicopter, operated by Whitsunday Air Services, was heading to a popular sightseeing pontoon along the reef about 40 miles north of the Whitsunday Islands.

Spectators already on the pontoon watched as the helicopter plunged into the water and the pilot desperately tried to pull a passenger from the wreckage.

“This is a traumatic experience for anyone in the situation there,” Inspector Ian Haughton of the Queensland Police said Thursday at a news conference.

Police said those killed were a 65-year-old woman sitting in the front passenger seat and a 79-year-old man. They have not been formally identified but knew each other and were residents of Hawaii.

The pilot and two more Americans, a 33-year-old woman and 34-year-old man, both Colorado residents, survived with minor injuries. They knew the two killed Wednesday afternoon, but the police did not confirm how.

Haughton said the pilot, whom police described as experienced, tried to rescue the older woman.

The helicopter was on its final approach for landing at the Hardy Reef viewing pontoon on what was a routine flight, police said.

It was the second accident for the company in recent months. In November, a Whitsunday Air Services helicopter with three passengers on board ditched near Hamilton Island in the Whitsundays.

Haughton said the cause of Wednesday’s crash was not yet clear.

“Something went wrong, and the consequences are tragic,” he said. “An independent, robust and transparent investigation is currently underway.”

The inquiry will involve Australia’s air transportation safety bureau and try to determine the helicopter’s service record, whether human error, bad weather or other factors played a part in the crash.

“There’s been a number of people involved: the ferry service, the rescue helicopter from Townsville, the emergency services that attended,” the inspector said. “But for those people that were on board you couldn’t begin to imagine the impact on those people.”

“It’s just gut-wrenching,” Andrew Willcox, the Whitsunday mayor, told the Australian Broadcasting Corp. of the crash Wednesday.