‘The shaking was just terrible’: Survivors recount Sea World helicopter collision

As Winnie de Silva’s helicopter began to spin, she grasped onto her son. She closed her eyes, and told him to do the same.

“When that bang came and the shaking started happening and things started falling on our faces that was when I realised it was not going to be safe. I was just worried, holding my son’s hand. The shaking was just terrible,” she told a Brisbane court.

“I was holding my son at the time and looking at everybody. Everyone was worried looking at the pilot. He couldn’t stabilise the helicopter. And it was spinning in a way that was very uncomfortable.”

De Silva, a mother from Geelong, told the Coroners Court in Brisbane on Monday of the final moments before her Sea World helicopter collided with another chopper from the company over the Gold Coast’s Broadwater on January 2, 2023.

Never-before-seen footage of the two helicopters colliding, showing the moment of impact, was released by Coroner Carol Lee, as an inquest into the crash began on Monday. Sea World chief pilot Ash Jenkinson, British couple Ron and Diane Hughes and Sydney mother Vanessa Tadros were killed. Tadros’ 10-year-old son Nicholas survived after weeks in intensive care.

The pilot of the other Sea World helicopter, Michael James, managed to land his chopper.

Just an hour earlier, de Silva told the court she had lunch with her son, Leon, 9. They had booked the ticket for the Sea World Helicopters scenic flight in the spur of the moment during an offer.

As the chopper spiralled down, de Silva lost consciousness, and remembered waking trapped. She was burning. And she couldn’t see her son.

“One of the people helping had put a board under me and I just remember screaming ‘my legs’ because I could not feel them,” she told the inquest.

She remembered asking people on the scene what was burning her. She was told it was aviation fluid.

Trapped and injured, she asked where her son was. She was told he was safe.

“At this time I was just so helpless under the helicopter,” she told the court.

The mother remembered how she had been stuck for 30 minutes, and the moment firefighters arrived and began cutting the sides of the helicopter.

Sergeant Justin Dunn was one of the first on the scene for Gold Coast water police. He told the court how he saw Jenkinson, and there were no signs of life.

He then walked around the aircraft, and saw Mr Hughes could not be saved. A member of the public was performing CPR on Ms Hughes and Tadros. Both women were unable to be saved.

Dunn says he saw Tadros’ son, Nicholas, being treated by a member of the public, and he was conscious in a recovery position.

As Dunn approached the rear of the aircraft, which he says was a mangled wreck, he saw someone – de Silva – was trapped under the frame.

“I crawled in under the air frame. I introduced myself to Winnie and I told her we’d help her and help was on the way. At that stage there was a lot of fuel coming down over the top of both of us,” he told the court.

Dunn said water was being poured over the aircraft. “It was extremely hot underneath,” he recalled. He was under the aircraft for seven minutes before he exited.

Another surviving passenger on board James’ helicopter, Jesse Maya, told the court the crash had been a big blur for him.

“I don’t know how I got out of the helicopter,” he told the court.

Maya had recorded the moments before the crash. He told police that he believed he started telling the pilot “helicopter, helicopter!” as Jenkinson’s chopper approached.

He says he could not remember if he was yelling or saying it.

Footage of the final seconds before the two helicopters crashed emerged in the days after the incident, showing one helicopter taking off and heading towards the other.

Several family members in the court watched the footage on Monday morning, which showed a passenger in the back seat of one of the helicopters, flown by James, tapping the pilot on the shoulder several times to alert him to the nearby helicopter.

The videos then showed to the court depicted the helicopters colliding, before James was able to gain control of his helicopter and land on a sandbar.

James died last year from cancer.

The ATSB said a number of passengers were ejected from their seatbelts during the crash and if the seatbelts had been properly fitted, it might have led to more survivability.

In opening the inquest, counsel assisting Ian Harvey told the court both pilots did not see each other before the crash.

He said the fundamental question was how that situation could unfold with two highly experienced pilots.

In the days before Christmas, Jenkinson had flown into a controlled airspace, and he was warned that the helicopter did not have a functioning transponder. The transponder was necessary for air operations to identify the aircraft in the area.

Jenkinson had not known about the non-functioning transponder until he received a warning in the weeks before the new year to have it fixed.

The inquest heard one specific issue the ATSB had focused on in their investigation was the radio communication. The court heard due to faults with Jenkinson’s radio, a taxi call likely made from him was not transmitted before the crash.

Harvey said the helipads were used by Sea World Helicopters in one of the busiest air corridors in the country.

Harvey questioned whether the commercial imperative to have new helicopters added to the Sea World fleet before Christmas 2022 overrode full consideration of safety factors, and whether this had brought untoward pressure on Jenkinson, who was the chief pilot.

At the end of his opening address, Harvey, who described the accident as a terrible day of shock and grief, became emotional when speaking of how the families had been impacted.

The inquest is scheduled to run for two weeks, and will hear from 30 witnesses, including surviving passengers, police and Sea World employees.

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