Two Photographers Killed In Florida Helicopter Crash
SARASOTA, FL (September 11, 2007) - A helicopter on a photo shoot for a boating magazine crashed into the ocean this morning off the coast of Florida near Casey Key and two photographers were killed. Only the pilot survived the accident.
Former WRAL-TV photojournalist Mark Copeland, 44, of Raleigh, NC, who left TV news to freelance, was killed along with photographer Thomas Newby, 50, of Manhattan Beach, CA.
The pilot, Mark Watters, 44, of Pasadena, CA, is reported to be in serious condition at the Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg. His wife, Leanne Suter, is a reporter for ABC7 Eyewitness News in Los Angeles.
ABC7 Eyewitness News reported tonight that the helicopter crashed about two miles off the coast in the Gulf of Mexico, south of Sarasota and off the shore of a barrier island, while flying along and above a boat that Powerboat magazine was testing. The magazine is based in Ventura, CA.
A spokesman for the Sarasota County Sheriff's Department told the Sarasota Herald-Tribune that the helicopter's skids may have touched the water, causing it to roll and crash.
Video shot by SNN News 6, a Comcast cable station that operates in conjunction with the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, shows what appears to be a part of the helicopter's white landing skid stuck into the left bow point of the red "cigarette boat" that was being photographed.
The boat's pilot and a model on the boat were not harmed. The model, Jennifer Zuknich, 28, a nurse at a Sarasota hospital, told the Herald-Tribune that "the front leg of the helicopter hit the water. All we saw was a wall of water." The newspaper reports that Zuknich and the boat's driver, Bob Teague, jumped into the water to help the three helicopter occupants, who were now floating on the surface of the sea in a slick of helicopter fuel. Zuknich helped Copeland, who was still breathing, she said, and Newby, who needed CPR in the water. She said Watters was suffering from two broken legs. Copeland and Newby were pronounced dead when their bodies were brought to shore, a Sarasota County Sheriff's deputy said.
A witness who saw the crash, Sean York, told ABC7 Eyewitness News that he saw the helicopter come close to the water, and then flip. "The helicopter went to the front and then was just coming back when the boat hit a wave, or a roller, and threw a rooster tail of water up that caught the helicopter prop, which basically threw [the helicopter] into the water. I saw the helicopter go down and the boat turn around and instantly called 911." York said the helicopter was underwater in about 20 feet of water, and rescue workers soon arrived.
An Emmy-winning photojournalist, Copeland was a former NPPA member and an accomplished videographer and Steadicam operator who left WRAL-TV in 1999 after 12 years on staff to freelance and start his own business, Original Productions, LLC. His clients included all the major television networks as well as the History Channel, the Learning Channel, Disney, TNN, PBS, E! Entertainment Television, and many other corporate clients. He also shot video for Duke University, the University of North Carolina, North Carolina State University, the University of Tennessee, and Penn State University, along with working on several music videos and feature films. He was a member of the Stedicam Operators Association.
Newby was the chief photographer for Powerboat magazine. He joined the magazine in 1993, and they report he's shot more than 324,000 photographs for them and that he was best known for his "breath-taking and exhilarating photography of offshore racing." Newby also did corporate shoots for Toyota, Volvo America, General Motors, and Carl's Jr., the magazine reports. His biography says that when he was 18, he crossed the Pacific Ocean in a 31-foot Ketch, and has since mastered all types of boats. He was a graduate of Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, CA. The magazine says Newby was married and had two sons.
Watters is a veteran camera pilot who specializes in offshore boat photography. Powerboat magazine has reported that he's a veteran pilot with thousands of hours logged flying while photographing boats. The City of Corona, CA, reports that Watters has been a pilot for their police helicopter, Crown 1, and that he was a Chief Warrant Officer and pilot in the Army National Guard with more than 20 years experience as a military helicopter pilot. They say that he is "one of the few pilots in the country capable of high speed, low-altitude flying for racing photography," and that Watters is a certified flight instructor who leads the commercial flight training program for the Corona Police Department.
The Federal Aviation Administration and the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating the accident.
On July 27, two news helicopters covering a police chase in Phoenix, AZ, collided midair and crashed killing four journalists. PIlot/reporter Scott Bowerbank and photojournalist Jim Cox in Channel 3's helicopter, and pilot/reporter Craig Smith and photojournalist Rick Krolak in Channel 15's helicopter, died when their two aircraft collided and crashed into Phoenix's Steele Indian School Park and then burned after covering a police chase of a stolen vehicle.
The NTSB investigation into that accident continues, but a preliminary report indicates that both pilots were reporting live, on the air, and were covering the chase at the time of the collision, and that Channel 15's helicopter may have been maneuvering at the time of the accident while Channel 3's helicopter was relatively motionless.
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