The weather is perhaps not unrelated to the crash that occurred Thursday afternoon at the Col du Béal (1390 m above sea level), on the border between Loire and Puy-de-Dôme. In the snow and fog that had fallen on the Forez mountains, a helicopter crashed with two men on board. They died in the accident. We do not yet know the identity of the victims, except their age: 47 and 49 years.
The weather conditions, which remain appalling this Friday at the Col du Béal, complicate the work of investigators from the Air Transport Gendarmerie Brigade (BGTA) who went there. Snow and fog and a negative temperature have also pushed the public authorities to close the pass to traffic at midday. Reporters from La Tribune-Le Progrès who had gone there, had to descend from the pass, at the risk of being blocked by the extreme winter conditions.
A flight to the Dordogne from Villefranche-sur-Saône
A command post (PC) of the fifteen gendarmes of the BGTA has been installed at the town hall of Saint-Pierre-la-Bourlhonne (Puy-de-Dôme). At the same time, the investigation and analysis office for civil aviation safety was seized.
According to the first elements of the investigation, a private Robinson R44 helicopter, belonging to the Périgord Heliclub, had taken off from Villefranche-sur-Saône (Rhône) around 3:30 p.m. Thursday, bound for Sarlat in the Dordogne, where the two originate from. victims, according to our information. The air traffic control center would have lost its signal around 5.30 p.m., while the aircraft was approaching the overflight of the Forez mountains.
The gendarmes spent the night there by -7 ° C
A Dragon 63 civil security helicopter, coming from Clermont-Ferrand, went on reconnaissance. He located the aircraft in flames at the Col du Béal around 6.30 pm. After landing, the emergency services could only note the death of the men on board. Despite the snow and fog, soldiers from Ambert’s gendarmerie company immediately went there and spent the night there, in -7 ° C.
They are currently trying to understand the precise conditions of this crash from the examination of the debris of the aircraft and the reconstruction of its flight.