Overview
- The Huey helicopter, which crashed Wednesday during water drops on Table Mountain National Park’s Hout Bay fire, left the pilot shaken but able to walk away.
- Emergency teams from SANParks, Wilderness Search and Rescue, City Fire and private medics reached the mountainside, secured the site and kept suppression work going.
- Early accounts from Kishugu Aviation suggest the main rotor clipped the cliff face, and the South African Civil Aviation Authority has opened a formal investigation.
- The wildfire that started along the Hout Bay Pipe Track has burned about 160 hectares between Hout Bay and Constantia Nek and is still being fought from the ground and air.
- Officials urged people to avoid trails around Constantia and Constantia Nek and to limit smoke exposure, as reports differed on whether the aircraft flew for Kishugu Aviation or Working on Fire.