By Jeff Outhit
Guelph Mercury
WATERLOO, Canada — Emergency dispatchers were so confused by a fatal helicopter crash at the Region of Waterloo International Airport last month that they tried to send the wrong firefighters from 23 kilometres away.
It’s the latest revelation to suggest that uncertain communications from multiple 911 dispatchers helped delay rescuers from reaching the crash at the airport.
The Waterloo Region Record obtained a recording of a 911 dispatch that was sent to the Baden firehall in Wilmot Township about nine minutes after the Nov. 28 crash.
The dispatcher asks Breslau and Maryhill to “respond for a helicopter crash. Two patients at the Waterloo international airport. 4881 Fountain Street North.”
The firehalls cited by the dispatcher are actually in Woolwich Township where the airport is located. “Dispatch this is Baden,” the Wilmot firehall responds. “You set off Baden’s tones. You may want to check if you got the right ones.”
After realizing the mistake the dispatcher contacts Woolwich firefighters 39 seconds later with the same airport request.
The crash killed helicopter pilot Tiffany Hanna and injured student pilot Scott Puillandre.
Politicians and rescuers have gone behind closed doors to review the emergency response, citing legal issues to justify the secrecy.
A report released in 2009 found that having four 911 dispatch systems in the region slows emergency response. But politicians have been unable or unwilling to streamline the system, citing technology, job, financing and governance hurdles.
Crash investigator Ewan Tasker does not believe a faster rescue would have saved the pilot. He understands she was alive after the helicopter crashed and civilian bystanders rushed to her aid.
“In this case the person who was fatally injured died quite quickly after the first people got to the scene,” said Tasker, regional senior investigator for the Transportation Safety Board of Canada.
The pilot had no vital signs when police arrived eight minutes after the crash, according to a timeline. Firefighters and paramedics did not reach the crash until several minutes after police. A timeline of events following the crash found that:
Emergency response launched in confusion after the first 911 call from the airport control tower misidentified the location.
The airport fire truck could have reached the crash within three minutes in ideal conditions. But it took 12 minutes to get there and arrived damaged after exiting the airport and colliding with part of a security gate.
Cambridge and Woolwich firefighters did not know where the helicopter crashed for many minutes after a second 911 call clarified the location. Fire chiefs now want to know if there was a delay in telling them the correct location.
Tasker knows the emergency response struggled. This is not unusual, he said. He intends to review the rescue as part of his crash investigation. Investigators have examined the fuselage and engine and still don’t know why the engine stopped before the two-seater crashed into a drainage pond shortly after takeoff.
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